Weber Shandwick Launches CultureShift 

CultureShift will help businesses realize their goals when undertaking mergers and acquisitions, restructurings or the adoption of new operating models. It can also be deployed proactively, fortifying organizations against market, generational and societal changes by anchoring employees around a shared purpose, values and set of behaviors.

 

“Beyond financial performance, companies today are increasingly judged by the values they stand for and the contributions they make to society. A values-driven business with a clearly defined culture is the key to navigating complexity, weathering turbulent times and succeeding in the war for talent,” said Micho Spring, chair, Global Corporate practice, Weber Shandwick.

 

Kate Bullinger, executive vice president and global head of Employee Engagement & Change Management, will lead the offering alongside a team of consultants with expertise in business strategy, business transformation and culture. This includes Alison Quirk, who joins Weber Shandwick as a senior advisor. A longtime coach and advisor to C-suite executives, Quirk was most recently State Street’s Chief Human Resources and Citizenship Officer, and a member of the Management Committee, the company’s senior-most strategy and policy making group. With extensive merger and integration (M&I) experience, Quirk will join fellow senior advisors Gary Sheffer and Don Spetner in counseling organizations as they address their most important business transformation challenges.

For CultureShift, Weber Shandwick will bring together several of its disciplines to instigate change in how employees work with each other and with customers. The move supports the firm’s continued investment in its management consulting capabilities, which began with the acquisition of United Minds, a business strategy consulting unit within Prime, based in Stockholm, Sweden. CultureShift is the first of a suite of new consultative offerings aimed at solving the pressing needs of C-suite clients in this era of rapid and dramatic business, social and cultural transformation.

 

“From the analytics and strategic insights capabilities within KRC Research and United Minds, to the leadership counsel provided by our corporate and change management experts, to our award-winning creative campaigns that inspire behavior change, Weber Shandwick is able to engage stakeholders at every level of an organization – from the C-suite to the plant floor – to embrace and deliver on shared values, vision and strategy,” Spring said.

 

Bullinger added: “You can put all the right people, tools and processes in place to advance a business strategy but without attention to how work gets done and the behaviors that are valued and rewarded, you’ll fall short of your goal. A market expansion strategy in a company that doesn’t value collaboration, or a new product development strategy that isn’t backed by a plan to drive innovation are fruitless endeavors. CultureShift helps executives understand how aligned their current culture is to the goals of their business strategy so that they can take action to accelerate new ways of working and ultimately transform their organizations for the better.”