Because I am a mom of elementary school age kids, I’ve been exposed to all sorts of strange and unusual ideas, concepts, and celebrations.  We have Dr. Seuss night (just a night to eat cake and hear stories to promote a love of reading) and we have the nights where we flush ice cubes down the toilet and sleep with pajamas on backwards and spoons under our pillows in order to get a snow day.  In preschool, my kids also had Opposite Day.  As I’m sure you can surmise, this is a day where everything you say and do is the opposite of what is expected.  (Luckily preschool makes this feasible – it’s only 2 hours and 3 or 4 year olds lack the stamina to really do EVERYTHING opposite.) 

As a parent, you learn to pick your battles, negotiate, and yes, use all sorts of psychology to achieve the goal of getting your toddler to eat, clean up, get in the car, or whatever it is you need him/her to do.  Early on, opposite day became one of my short-lived, but effective tools.  Simply declaring it Opposite Day (or Opposite Hour if need be) was usually enough to accomplish what I wanted.  But I never considered it a potential business tool until I read this.    

In this really interesting article, Peter Bregman suggests ways to change a corporate culture.  This explores a highly successful company with one major problem – people don’t want to work there.  His recommendation is to start by changing the stories your employees tell about the company they work for.  This is where Opposite Day comes into play.  You don’t announce Opposite Day, but instead you adopt an opposite mindset when making decisions and managing your people.  He suggests:

“To start a culture change all we need to do is two simple things:

1. Do dramatic story-worthy things that represent the culture we want to create. Then let other people tell stories about it.

1. Find other people who do story-worthy things that represent the culture we want to create. Then tell stories about them.

For example, if you want to create a faster moving, less perfectionist culture, instead of berating someone for sending an email without proper capitalization, send out a memo with typos in it.

Or if you want managers and employees to communicate more effectively, stop checking your computer in the middle of a conversation every time the new message sound beeps. Instead, put your computer to sleep when they walk in your office.

Or if you’re trying to create a more employee-focused culture, instead of making the bride work on her wedding day, give her the week off. “

In essence, think of it as opposite day.  If you don’t like your corporate culture and want to change it, consider what your company would typically do, then do the opposite and see what happens.  This could be the springboard for a new corporate culture.

What are your thoughts?  Have you ever worked to change a culture?  Is this a valid idea?