Consider all the great cultures of the world today, and those that have come and gone throughout history. In a society, culture develops organically and is one of the things that defines what a society is. That's because culture develops from an alignment of views and values among groups of people in a common geographical location that have shared beliefs, shared behavior, and accepted norms.

Culture in a society is driven by many things — by the vision of its political and religious leaders, the establishment of law and order, the contributions of its artists, writers, and thinkers, among others.

Culture in a corporation, by contrast, also develops in part on its own, but can also be leveraged as a strategic tool to drive success. As such, culture is something that begs to be recognized and understood by management, and driven by management's vision of the organization's raison d'etre—what it is, what it does, and how it adds value to the market and society it operates in. Culture should be driven and shaped by the vision of where management ultimately wants the organization to be in the future.

Communication is critical to the development of culture both in society and in an organization. After understanding management's vision, it is the role of the communicators in a corporation to shape the mental images, thoughts, and feelings that define the organization, and that enable workers at all levels to share a common understanding and appreciation of the organization and their role in it.

Culture is unavoidable. A corporation will always have a culture whether the people in it want one or not. If a corporate culture is allowed to develop on its own without being cultivated in accordance with vision, mission, and strategic objectives, it will be a culture that has no clear identity and no empowering effect on how the organization operates.

On the other hand, a culture that is based on a set of ideas that are credible, sensible, and clearly and simply articulated, will provide a platform of common understanding that all employees can stand firmly upon in their day-to-day jobs. A clear and compelling culture will motivate workers to perform well with a sense of purpose, commitment and serve as a vehicle of success into the future. Workers in an organization without a clear and shared culture, on the other hand, can become easily unbalanced when competitive pressures increase or when the unexpected occurs, such as a crisis.

Core values are a big part of what culture is about. Does your organization have a set of core values it vigorously promotes internally among employees? If no, now may be the time to develop one. If yes, now may be the time to take a look at your core values to make sure they're up to date. Essential core values over time will stay more or less the same. But as markets and structures evolve, core values should be revised from time to time to keep pace.

One of the most dynamic events in a company's cultural evolution is a merger or acquisition. When one company acquires another one, it not only inherits that company's products and services, but also an enormous body of unseen values and assumptions embedded in the minds of the new employees who join. What are their core values? How closely do they harmonize with yours? Chances are, some values will be the same, but others could be very different.

Harmonizing them is critical to the success of the new, collective whole.

For instance, let's say your company's core values are based on quality products, timely and responsive customer service, environmental performancež transparency, and employee satisfaction. Meanwhile, the core values of the company you just acquired are based largely on cost savings, bottom line performance, accountability, hard work, and productivity.

Right off the bat you can see potential synergies, as well as potential conflicts. It's the role of management and the communications staff to sort out the differences and develop a new paradigm that everyone can buy into.

How to go about doing that? The best approach is to put a "Culture Team" together consisting of employees from both organizations — ranging from top managers to blue collar staff — along with an objective, outside consulting company skilled at synergizing disparate corporate identities. Start by tracking the similarities, and tracking differences. Inside the group, decide what stays, and what goes. Then, take this new proposal to a wide sample of the new employee population. Conduct interviews, surveys, and informal face-to-face conversations. Do this with your own people, with a neutral and objective outside consulting firm leading the process. Get an understanding of what people understand the existing corporate culture to be, what they like and dislike about it, and pool their input and recommendations in a go-forward plan.

Before starting the process, let the news out first. A tenet of getting any message across and developing buy-in with any audience, especially employees, is: "Tell them you're going to tell them; tell them; and tell them you've told them." And that's where communications comes into play. Communicators are the mouthpiece of management; the shapers of the new message; the champions of the new combined culture. Communicators are the listeners to feedback and, ultimately, together with management, the facilitators of corporate cultural evolution. Based on this new body of knowledge, get your communicators to write a Corporate Culture plan, and then execute it.

Jaan Koel is the Principal and Founder of Koel Communications, a consulting firm based in Toronto.