136 | What It Really Takes to Change Organisational Culture | Clare Duffield

Hello there and welcome to this episode of the Building Better Cultures podcast with me, Scott McInnes. Really nice to have you here if it's your first time, really nice to have you back if it's not. Thanks for being here. My usual little ask at the start of every, maybe most podcast episodes is just if you have a few minutes, if however you are listening to us gives you the opportunity to give us a little rating and a little comment about what you like about the pod, then please take the opportunity to do so. It does really help in getting the podcast out there. And that's one of the reasons we do it, to get more people listening. So, really looking forward to today's episode, which is with a client that we worked with a couple of years ago, the Police Service of Northern Ireland. And I'm delighted to be joined by Assistant Chief Officer Claire Duffield, who is Assistant Chief Officer for People and Organisational Development in the organisation. Claire, good morning.

Guten Morgen, Scott. Thank you very much for inviting me to join you.

You're welcome, you're very welcome. Listen, so it's been a little while since we worked together on your culture audit. We're going to talk about that a little bit more later on, but why don't we kick off with you just perhaps giving listeners a bit of a feel for, for you about the PSNI and perhaps your role in there.

Okay, well, hi everyone that's listening. Lovely to be part of this and opportunity to talk about workplace culture, which is something that's close to my heart throughout my career. So I'm a mum, a triathlete, and an HR professional. I have an HR professional background, currently working in the Police Service of Northern Ireland, which is a fantastic organization doing really important work for the public and communities of Northern Ireland. I started my career in the retail business and then found a passion for all of the people people aspects of business. So after 15 years in retailing, and then as a, as a mum at that stage with young kids, and so I didn't have to travel so much, moved back to roles in Northern Ireland. First of all in the health service, then in education, and today in policing. So varied experience of workplace culture, and today have responsibility for a number of different functions and departments within PSNI. So the traditional HR service that we offer, which has specialisms and HR services, occupational health and wellbeing, and all of our police college where we train and deliver learning and development products for officers and staff, and health and safety. So a bit of a portfolio of services.

Brilliant, brilliant, thanks. I love that the HR one came last in that list of mum, triathlete, HR professional. Tell me a little bit. So, let's dive straight into culture, something that you said is very close to your heart. What do you see as being the key ingredients to nurture a culture that really serves your people and the organization? And I guess, actually, interestingly, in your case, the public, the people that the PSNI serves.

Yeah, well, I suppose, you know, out there, there are so many academic models, theories, definitions of culture. And, you know, I've experienced those in different ways in different organizations, but for me, I'm sort of a straight talker, and I like to keep things that are meaningful to the workforce because, you know, the term workplace culture, etc., none of that HR speak evokes warm feelings amongst the majority of the workforce. So for me, you know, culture is, um, what's it like to work here? And would I recommend this as a friend, to a friend? Would I recommend this organization as an employer to a friend? And then in terms of the key ingredients, well, I think first and foremost for any business, any organization, you have to be clear on why you exist. So what is the mission and purpose of the organization? And then what are the traits, behaviors, practices that you see in your systems and processes and in your people that help you achieve that aim. So, you know, for us here in PSNI, gosh, the mission and the purpose is so compelling and so important because it's about keeping people safe, it's about fighting crime, it's about bringing offenders to justice, um, by being victim-focused, community-focused, workforce-focused. So I think, you know, does— do all of our behaviors as individuals and as teams, do they then help us achieve that mission and purpose?

And do you think that— I, I think that what the mission and purpose that you have is incredibly noble, and I always think it's, it's easier in organizations where you do have something very powerful and very human, whether it be policing or whether working in healthcare where you're actually perhaps saving lives or helping people to get better. That's easier to, to sell and bring to life for employees Have you any thoughts on, in organizations, or maybe listeners are listening where they maybe don't work in organizations, maybe it's, I don't know, a bank, maybe it's an insurance company, maybe it's something, somebody just sells widgets. How do they do it?

Well, you know, I think it's about finding that hook. And, you know, usually, you know, first of all, and again, why do you recruit the people that you're recruiting? Do they want to work? When you're selecting the talent to join your organization, do they have some type of connection to it? So if it's a retail business, you know, maybe they grew up in a family of retailers or they have a real flair for product display or selling, you know. So I think there's something about the values and the skills of the people, and then that allows you to find how can you hook that in to what that business is there to do in that way. And You know, there will always be a way to ensure that every member of the workforce knows that their job is important in achieving the mission. And quite often, that's just down to the human skills that they bring. So it might be problem solving, it might be their ability to engage with customers, it might be their clinical excellence in healthcare. And interestingly, you know, I've worked in healthcare And there, that's an organisation where obviously clinical standards and patient safety, you know, are paramount. So, you know, you're going to be in a culture there where risk-taking is less likely to feature. And so somebody who enjoys risk-taking might not fit well into that. So I think it, it really makes you think about recruiting the right people that are going to fit the mission and purpose of your organisation. Now, I don't say that in a way where I mean to be discriminatory or not diverse or inclusive about the workforce, but there is something about making making sure that there is that connection and alignment for people.

Yeah, definitely. And when you think back to just— if we think about that idea of the cause and the mission and the purpose at a more maybe global level, um, I think policing globally over the past few years has, has gotten a bit of a pasting. And, you know, we, we look back at some of the things that have happened and, and some of the challenges, and, and I think that a lot of those challenges then reflect not just on the police forces, whether it be the Met, whether it be the, you know, police forces in the US, we look at those not as localised issues but as, well, if that's happening there, it must be happening everywhere. And I wonder what, what, what is the impact of those global policing challenges on officers and staff in your organisation when it comes to culture?

Yeah, well, I mean, you're quite right, Scott McInnes. It's fair to say that PSNI is possibly, probably likely to be the most scrutinised public service in the UK, if not beyond that, those boundaries. And then on top of that, you have all of the thoughts, evidence, some evidence, some, some media, some not, you know, some myths around policing and how policing is delivered to different societies and communities. So, you know, just by way of example, there, you know, there's been, you know, media attention and evidence around policing response to Black Lives Matter protests. Obviously, there was the murder of Sarah Everard by a police officer from the Met, as you've mentioned. You know, in Northern Ireland, we're trying to deliver policing in a post-conflict society, and we're under significant political scrutiny, media scrutiny. And therefore, you know, as well, we want to be representative of the communities that we serve. So our workforce composition is critical to that, and we do know that we have a number of underrepresented groups. So, you know, what does that mean? Gosh, well, you know, it's a really challenging, like, foundation or platform on which to, like, delve into culture to start with. And I think, like, first and foremost, we had to be pretty courageous to do this, but it was the right thing to do because all good organizations, irrespective of what they do and where they do it, should understand their culture and does it align to their mission and purpose. So we sort of came reminding ourselves about that and saying, you know, let's do the right thing rather than get caught up in what we think people will say about this. And upfront, you'll know this because you worked with us on the project, but we made 3 really simple, you know, commitments to our workforce when we were embarking on this cultural audit survey and feedback session. So we said, one, we want you to participate, your opinions matter. And we will publish the results in full, which, you know, openness and transparency was— there were a lot of questions about that and they were saying, "Oh, well, if it says bad things, they'll not tell us." And we said, "No, we will absolutely publish these results in full." Two is that because we were embarking on this, we needed to give those who were going to participate a feeling of a little bit of security and safety that they could say what they genuinely thought. So we engaged with yourselves, an independent partner. So there was that gap between and protection of somebody's individual data, as it were. And then thirdly, we made the commitment that we would take action on it, and we've got, you know, we've been spending our last 18 months focusing on that part, which we'll come to, I'm sure. So yeah, significant challenges when you're thinking about delving into your culture, depending on your organisation. And, you know, being really clear on, I suppose, the appetite of your senior team to embark on this type of work, commit to it upfront, and then follow through. Because, you know, culture isn't something that you change or develop overnight. You know, that's like, I think you used the term, Deos, when you were working with us, Scott, around the difference between culture and climate in an organisation. So yeah, those are just some of the challenges that we have. Taking on the cultural audit, I think, you know, it helped us do 3 things. We got, you know, facts and evidence and baseline data, both qualitative and quantitative. We were able to do some root cause analysis because what the symptom was might not actually have been the root cause. And then it also helped us to do a bit of myth-busting. So there were quite a few controversial things that some of our critics were expecting to see and maybe they didn't see that in the results.

Yeah, yeah, and it's a really good point. And, and I think that just— there was a huge amount in what you just said there, and I'm just processing it through— that I think probably one of the big pieces is that when, when you're thinking about going out and, and testing the culture or auditing the culture of the organization, it's not just about the micro existing culture or environment in which you're doing that, the context in which you're doing it. We also do have to think about what is the macro culture as well? What's the macro context that we're doing it in? Because, you know, every organisational culture sits within a bigger, wider context than just the organisation. So it's worth just having a think about that as well too, isn't it?

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, we, I mean, really practically, we absolutely anticipated that the findings of our audit on culture would make front page headlines, that's sort of very commonplace for the examination of policing in Northern Ireland. And, you know, okay, yes, some of the findings did end up being reported around, but because of the open and transparent approach that we took, that didn't have the same negative impact that it could have. And actually, some of the initiatives that we've put in place to address the findings because we've worked very closely in partnership with our staff associations throughout it, have actually, you know, created very positive headlines in some of the actions that we've taken. So I thought when you invited me on, you hadn't remembered how much I like to talk about this type of thing, so you'll have to interrupt me as we go.

This might— when I said 35 minutes, this could be an hour and a half, people, so buckle up. Let's go back to the findings. What I'd love to do is hear a little bit about what concerned you in the findings in the report, and what positives did you see?

What kind of made you go, "Oh good, there's some good stuff here that we can build on." Okay, so I mean, we had obviously a survey which was 40 different cultural statements that we asked our workforce to respond to on a scale of 1 to 7, and then you know, you and your colleagues helped us facilitate some workshops where we were able to really drill down into root cause analysis and some of those themes. I suppose concerns— if I start with the concerns and I'll finish with the strengths— overall, you know, the scores were low. So it wasn't just that there was one area that scored quite low in terms of strongly disagree that this is a trait that it was visible or dissatisfied, but the scores were low pretty much across the board, and that really brought into question, you know, I suppose the level of development or maturity, if I call it that, you know, that existed in the organization when it came to cultural development and investment in people, particularly investment in people, you know, had it been— had the workforce got a little bit left behind because of underfunding, because of they're so busy focusing on giving their services to the public that they, you know, that we've forgotten about giving our services as an employer to our workforce. And I suppose, you know, concern then for me professionally, I was concerned about, oh gosh, the scale of change here is big. Can we do this? And bear in mind that you know, we did this at a time of considerable financial constraint. Um, you know, we'd stopped recruitment because it was unaffordable, um, and the resources that we did have, our police officers and police staff were exhausted, but yet they were still showing up doing incredible, brave, courageous work every day. Um, so any commitment to progress and change was going to have to be with whatever we had, not with additional funding necessarily. Um, we also, I suppose there were, there were 3 underlying assumptions, cultural assumptions that the survey told us that we had, and one of them, you know, was sort of badged as "we are fearful." Now bear in mind that PSNI exists to keep people safe, so for one of our cultural assumptions to be "we are fearful," you know, That's not particularly positive language, but when we did the root cause analysis and drilled down into that, that was less about the external threat under which our workforce operate, albeit that is real, and we've seen evidence of that regrettably even in the last couple of years, but it was actually more as a result of the work about the scrutiny that their work comes under and about behaviours and conduct within the organisation and being held to account by, you know, the Ombudsman as an external organisation and through our professional standards department. So I suppose in the concerns piece, it really highlighted the need for us to see the interconnectivity between what the cultural findings were telling us. On a positive, oh my goodness, I mean, what an incredible workforce we have, and it was like a real reminder of that. So despite considerable challenge, under-resourcing, delayed pay awards, you know, challenging scrutinised organisation, you know, post-conflict society, different expectations of communities for around policing. Despite all that, the teams were cohesive, they delivered above all else, and those were some of the real positives that, you know, we were hearing about in the audit, you know, around the desire to work with communities to find solutions, that, you know, they would respond and deliver to achieve outcomes even when things were difficult. And also we saw some feedback that, you know, they did— even though we operated in those challenging circumstances, that they recognized that well-being was important. So workforce well-being. And they recognized that some efforts had been taken around trying to create an organization that, you know, better represented the community, even if that hadn't actually shifted in, in the demographic.

I think one of the things— and I love that answer, thank you— I think one of the things that really struck me particularly when we were doing workshops and focus groups was this unbelievable sense of civic duty. Because I don't think— I think that when you first join policing, whether it's the PSNI, the Met, Strathclyde Police, wherever, or when you first become a nurse, or when you first become somebody that works in public service, the pay isn't great.

Great.

Like, it's not— it's, you know, they aren't necessarily very well-paid jobs. And I kind of just go, wow, you know, putting yourself in danger for that, for that salary. And just that sense of civic duty that people seem to have was unbelievable. It was unbelievable. Um, that sense of wanting to do better for others, wanting to serve others, was, was palpable.

Yeah, I mean, having worked in other organizations, I, I'm humbled, you know, by some of the experiences that, you know, officers and staff tell me about, and about, you know, the reality of working in PSNI. You know, we have— there are— that we have police officers and police staff who, who have not told their friends or family where they work. Um, we have police staff and police officers who, who— they— it's not just they who have signed up to be part of this incredible organisation, but they've actually really signed up their families because of the support that they give them. You know, this is a contract of employment plus. So, you know, us understanding our workplace culture is so important because we got to be able to give back. You know, that contract has to work both ways. And one of the things as well, we realized that given, you know, given that we were trying just to survive with the funding that we had in order to keep delivering the services that we we are responsible for, you know, in that sometimes you forget to recognise and celebrate the amazing achievements and just the everyday acts of heroism and selflessness and courage and help and support and care that our staff and officers give to victims or other members of the public. So since the results, you know, we've put huge effort into starting to, you know, remind everybody about, you know, the pride of the workforce and the great work that is done, and trying to get the different stories in the headlines internally and externally.

Yeah, brilliant. You touched there on one of the three kind of themes that came out of the audit, which was around being fearful. And I think that, you know, certainly from our perspective, one of the angles on that was people feeling supported. When they make decisions, that they know that somebody has got their back. And it was referred to many times as top cover. Um, how do you— how can organizations address an issue where people in the organization may not necessarily think that the organization has their back?

Oh, um, I think I mean, you might not be surprised at me saying this given I'm in the HR profession, but I think it's about that, you know, know your people, and it's the human connection. You know, it starts with trust and confidence. If we want our communities and the public to have trust and confidence in us, same for any business, you know, if it's a retailer, you want your customers to have trust and confidence in you so that they return and buy from you again and not a competitor. But if we want the public to have trust and confidence in us, our workforce have to have trust and confidence in their employer. So, and that is one step at a time. So building trust through openness and transparency, visible accessible leadership. I'm a real believer in the line manager making the difference. Someone just feels like somebody cares about me as a person and I've got somebody to talk to. And I mean, for us in particular, you know, and in policing in particular, there is a real focus on how we handle, you know, misconduct and any breaches of our code of ethics. I mean, of course, the public expect police officers to demonstrate the highest standards of professional conduct at all times. You know, at the end of the day, they're there to uphold the law, so therefore there's a— there's nearly a higher expectation. And, and, uh, we've done quite a bit of work around looking at how those work where there are alleged, um, uh, examples of misconduct, how those are investigated in a way which balances accountability and common sense, if I say that, and being fair. So, you know, actually, is this about a coaching conversation, helping somebody learn, and a learning culture where we do get things wrong? We will all get things wrong, but that's how we learn and grow, and let's deal with it in a coaching and learning environment versus the need for a more formal investigation through the relevant, you know, processes and procedures. So I think being very open that we were rebalancing in that way and encouraging that, you know, we want to be a learning organisation and taking that approach. But that's about local line management confidence in being able to observe, feedback, and coach the behaviors and the performance of their teams on a regular basis.

Yeah, it's that age-old question, how could you have done that differently, do you think? You know, that, that, the leaders having the capability, the skills to be able to have those conversations is incredibly powerful, but that also takes people, which comes back to your point about trust, people in organizations going, well, I'll just make the decision and I know I'm probably 70% there. So you know what, I can just, I'll just go for it and let's see what happens. But then for that leader to come in afterwards and have that coaching conversation to say, look, that didn't pan out quite as you expected. How might we, how might we do that differently in the future? But also then making sure that managers then taking the responsibility to have those conversations rather than passing that up the line to a conduct committee or a conduct department for them to be able to sort out. Leaders have to take that responsibility on themselves, right?

Absolutely. And what was— I can look back now and say fascinating, but it's probably the wrong word, and, you know, to describe this. But during the time that we were conducting our cultural audit We had a series of unprecedented events in this organization, many of which were all in and around this very area of trust, top cover as you've called it, you know, belief in the leadership, somebody having my back. So we started this, you know, explorative process with our culture law, I think in January of 2023. Later that year, I mean, we had the attempted murder of a serving police officer. We had a judicial review on a case that had been explored, which was all about the treatment of officers and their conduct during a policing event that happened on the Ormond Road. We had the— one of the largest data breaches that has been experienced across the UK. Again, an issue that obviously had significant trust and confidence of the workforce, and the workforce saying, who's to blame for this? My personal data has been leaked. And obviously there are significant security ramifications for that. We had the Chief Constable— resulting in the Chief Constable resigning their position, and the Deputy Chief Constable not returning to their desk, and others, you know, with industrial action. We had pay awards that weren't paid, you know. So we had— it was It was like— I can't describe the turbulence that the organization faced at that time. And if you were a member, or as a member of that workforce, you know, to therefore go, well, who, you know, hang on a minute here, like, who's got my back? I'm the officer that throughout all this, I'm the member of staff that throughout all this has turned up every day, committed to my job, you know, laid with families who have got— who've experienced some of the most horrific things they may have had to in their life because of a crime that they've been subject to. You know, they, they've been kept investigating, they've kept supporting our services, having all our equipment on the road, despite— and the people are going, who's got my back during this? And in a, in a, in an interesting way, when we got through that very acute phase, that enabled us to really, really, I suppose, maximise on this opportunity to say, you know, it was nearly like a moment where we were able to reset and go, we've got to approach this differently. This is about, you know, the person behind the uniform, and, you know, we are here for them. And as we described earlier in the podcast about how much those people give every day, and what do we then as an employer give to make it a great place to work.

Yeah, and to the credit of the organization, those 3 things that happened, and then the Chief Con going as a result, were enormous, enormous challenges. Yet the organization said, you and the team said, let's just keep going because this is important. And I think that was a real credit to the organization.

I think my advice to anyone, you know, listening, going, you know, how do you ever, like, where do you start with that? It's just something about one step at a time, marginal gains and that relentless belief coming back to why, the why, why are we here doing it and who is here to help us do it? You know, just that one step at a time.

Yeah, yeah. Let's look forward because, of course, you said at the top, Claire, that one of your three promises to people in the organization was that we would make change happen. How did the results of the audit shape your change plans, and what are some of the practical things that you're doing as a result to try and move now the culture forward?

Okay, well, I think first and foremost, we didn't just come up with the actions or ideas to address on our own, you know, in our little boardroom in headquarters. It was really important that we included our you know, officer and staff representatives. So we've got a forum called Your Voice, just one example, but, and all of our minority and diversity staff associations and the Police Federation, Superintendents Association, NIPSA trade union, they all are involved in, in that forum and, and other others that we have. So first, we took time. So it would have been dead easy to get the results and just sort of jumped immediately to dissecting them. We said, hang on a minute, let's respect the fact that, you know, over 4,000 of our workforce have told us what they think. Let's just digest that. Let's actually listen, you know, let's actually take time to listen and hear what they've said. And then we moved into that sort of prioritisation. So of the recommendations that came out, we then said, okay, what are some of the really practical things that that are, you know, sort of actionable initiatives or changes that we need to do, because we knew that there was a need to sort of really clearly and overtly link and label what we were doing back to the audit so people could see and feel a difference, and again build that trust that we were taking action. So we had, you know, there were some things that were as simple as We had paused some of our recognition and medal ceremonies, so we reintroduced those and have a calendar of recognition events that we now publish and celebrate and recognize all sorts of great work. You know, the diversity across our workforce, problem-solving awards, and other awards that are in partnership with other organizations. So a whole commitment to recognition and rebuilding and celebrating the fantastic, you know, work and achievements and performance that happens across the organisation and across multidisciplinary teams. There was a real commitment to visible and accessibility of the leadership team, and, you know, so we have continued to make sure that our engagement with all of our representative groups is very active and frequent, and that that happens locally as well as I'm going to say centrally, and then we have developed a— I say I call it initiative, but we're running large-scale team events called Team PSNI, which has taken a wee bit of investment, but that's about, again, connecting the workforce together so that they can celebrate what happens in all different parts of the organisation, that we're all part of one team, there's a live Q&A session with the service executive team and they can ask any question that they want and they do. It keeps us challenged and gives us ideas. So that, we've had over 2,000 people attend those events so far and the feedback, we've been getting some feedback from those events that link to the questions that we did in the cultural audit and already demonstrating that people's views are shifting. And then again, like, this is a really fundamental important thing. We've restarted recruitment. So we have, you know, our Chief Constable in his external messaging to our sponsor department, our policing board, our politicians, to say this has to stop in terms of our— we need to invest in the police service if we want to keep people safe, not impact neighbourhood policing. We are, you know, starting to accept that we've been in a period of survival, and we now need to try and recover our officer and staff numbers to a minimum level, and being very, you know, giving the organisation hope with that. So, yes, it's tough out there, and we're asking you to absorb more, but, you know, there's hope that we are leading this organization in the right way to address some of it. So, those are just some of the examples of actions that we've taken.

Brilliant, which to listeners might seem like, you know, very basic standard things, but actually often they're the most important things. Talk to people, get them in the room, listen to them, recognize, make sure they've got the resources that they need to do their jobs really well. And those things are all part and parcel of creating, creating amazing culture. We are nearly at the end of our time, unfortunately, because I know that you and I could talk about this stuff all day. Last question, and just in 30 seconds: where organizations are going through a program of culture change, what is the most important place to focus, do you think?

Well, I think if it's around cultural change, focus on the why. So why— what is the mission and purpose of this organization? Why does it exist? And then how to connect your people to that mission, and what do you need to give to them to demonstrate that they matter to you? Um, and then Yeah, brilliant.

Claire, it's been an absolute pleasure having you on. Thanks a million for, for being here, for sharing the story, for sharing some of your experiences of the whole idea of just even getting involved in a cultural audit. So, um, thanks a mil.