• by J. Walker Smith , Op-Ed Contributor, August 7, 2024

“Culture eats strategy for breakfast,” wrote Peter Drucker. Exactly.

Everybody has heard this quote. And whenever somebody mentions it, heads nod, many vigorously. But do we really believe it? How hard do we work to put this insight into practice? Do we even know what culture means?

I was reminded of this recently while reading a book recommended to me by my long-time friend and colleague Dr. Ken Bernhardt, the Regents Professor of Marketing Emeritus at Georgia State University. The book is Covert Cows and Chick-fil-A (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 2019) by Steve Robinson, who ran marketing at Chick-fil-A (CFA) from 1981 to 2015.

Over four decades of consulting for CFA, Ken had a bird’s-eye view as CFA built its local brand into a national phenomenon, soon to go global. Not the least part of which are those iconic cows bent on self-preservation with their hoof-scrawled missive, “Eat Mor Chiken.”

Ken is right about Steve’s book. It is instructive, informative and fun to read. It is all about the transformation of CFA from a business rooted in operational excellence to a business driven by brand excellence.

The secret to CFA’s success is right there in the sub-title—How Faith, Cows and Chicken Built An Iconic Brand. The first six words of Steve’s book are Drucker redux: “Great brands grow from great cultures.” Company culture is everything. This is a book about culture supercharging strategy.

I’m sure, though, that the word faith in the sub-title has already scared you off. Just substitute the word culture. Because as Steve makes clear, the Christian values that founder Truett Cathy brought to his business were about faithful stewardship and having a positive influence. Indeed, that’s CFA’s corporate purpose.

If this sounds treacly or insincere to your cynical ear, remember that Google’s original motto was “Don’t be evil.” Which is still part of Google’s code of conduct. The current motto of parent company Alphabet is “Do the right thing.”

CFA is “not a ‘Christian business,’” Steve notes, “but rather a business where the owners and leadership aspired to apply and live out biblical principles.” In other words, a do-unto-others, customer-first business that is grounded in a thorough-going culture of doing the right thing—prioritizing the stewardship of profits; building the business by building people; adding value not taking value; making long-term commitments not stopgap deals; and hiring responsibly, then delegating responsibility. Not just employees, but leaders, too.

All of this is sensible, and strictly speaking, nothing new. Except for CFA it’s not just culture for the company. It’s culture for management as well. Steve writes about the several months over which he was interviewed repeatedly before being offered a job. It wasn’t merely about his competency. It was mostly about character and chemistry.

Once Steve was on board and evaluating new hires himself, he paid close attention to a candidate’s “personal alignment” with the values and purpose of the business. Not to screen out non-Christians. Rather, to bring in leaders who would live by the culture and values at the heart of the business rather than antiseptically managing the culture at arms-length or, worse, expect certain values from others that they did not expect of themselves.

This is where culture hits the rocks for all too many companies and brands. Leaders champion a culture but are not personally aligned with it. People notice.

Employee surveys find over and over that there is a Grand Canyon-sized gap between perceptions of what companies say they believe in and perceptions of what companies deliver. And in perceptions of the mission of the business versus the importance of an individual employee’s job. And in perceptions of the accountability applied to management compared to that applied to employees.

Culture and values are stated, but not shared. Lauded, but not lived.

Maybe some of the blame falls on employees, or even on customers, who expect too much. But whatever the reason, it’s still a leadership responsibility to close that gap. Which company leaders will not be able to do unless they truly and honestly lean into culture and values.

Treating values with a vulturine mindset is a bewitching temptation these days. Our polarized politics have made it so. Leading to strategies like aligning with ‘conservative’ political values in order to profit from arbitraging the digital media costs of customer acquisition.

There probably is money to be made with strategies like that. But at what cost to trust, propriety and civility. And at what cost to a brand.

After all, Chick-fil-A’s unwavering, top-to-bottom commitment to values rooted in honesty, respect and charity laid the foundation for a company culture that created one of the greatest, most iconic advertising campaigns ever. Those cows have won many awards, including two halls of fame and inclusion in the Smithsonian American History Museum. All while selling a whole lot of chicken sandwiches.

Not a bad breakfast.