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On culture as something a company practises daily rather than announces once a year.

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This week in culture

What is going wrong out there, and what we would do about each

Real stories, every figure traced back to whoever published it. Open a card for what the ritual prevents, what a module repairs, and what management would see.

A person in a dark jacket at a desk, one hand raised to their face beside a laptopStress Awareness Week, 2 to 6 November 2026

Health and Safety Executive

6 days ago

HSE urges employers to take action on work-related stress during Stress Awareness Week

The regulator's message is not about wellbeing perks. It is that stress is a health and safety risk, and an employer assesses it the way it assesses any other: find the causes, ask the people affected, act. HSE still says many employers do not realise they must - and its six areas, from demands to change, are all things a manager shapes.

964,000workers in Great Britain with work-related stress, depression or anxiety

HSE's annual estimate from the Labour Force Survey, 2024/25, self-reported: 52% of all work-related ill health and 22.1 million working days lost, an average of 22.9 days per case

What we would do about itBurnout
Before it happens
Well-Being and Resilience every working morning, for everybody on the same two-minute question. HSE's first step is to reach out and start the conversation about pressure; a daily habit means that conversation has already happened in small pieces before anybody has to open it formally.
After it has
Book Energy That Lasts for the team where the load has outrun the people: ten short daily lessons over two working weeks, one of them aimed at the load itself rather than the person carrying it, with two ten-minute debriefs its lead runs from a written guide. Each person chooses whether to take part, and the lead never sees what anybody writes.
What management sees
Engagement by team and by theme, so the team where fewer people answer each week shows before absence does. What anybody chose waits until enough have answered to hide each choice, and no screen shows an individual's. It is a reading of engagement, not a diagnosis: the judgement about causes and actions stays the employer's.

Reported by Health and Safety Executive (opens in a new tab)

Three colleagues in a meeting room, one speaking while the other two listen

MIT Sloan Management Review

10 days ago

What Interruptions Say About Your Organizational Culture

Who gets cut off, and who gets finished, is read by everyone in the room as a statement about whose ideas carry weight. The researchers found that subtle exclusion wears away people's sense of ownership and teaches them to hold back. It is rarely a policy problem, and nobody files a complaint about a sentence that was never allowed to end.

What we would do about itIncivility and Bullying
Before it happens
Respect and Inclusivity every working morning, as a two-minute question about the small things: who was heard today and who was talked over. Interruption is a habit before it is anything else, and a habit is changed by being noticed on ordinary days, not in a training session once a year.
After it has
Book Civility and Respect for the team where some voices have gone quiet: ten short daily lessons over two working weeks on the everyday slights that wear a room down and on what a colleague can do when they see one, with two ten-minute debriefs its lead runs from a written guide. Each person chooses whether to take part, and the lead sees that the team is doing it, never anyone's answers.
What management sees
Engagement by team and by theme, so the team where fewer people answer each week shows before the exit interviews do. What anybody chose waits until enough have answered to hide each choice, and no screen shows an individual's.

Reported by MIT Sloan Management Review (opens in a new tab)

A long boardroom table and chairs beside a wall of tall windows

Fair Play Talks

28 days ago

One in Three CEOs Now Describe Their Own Workplace Culture as Toxic, Reveals Research

The people running the company now agree with the people working in it: a third of chief executives call their own culture toxic, and two in five employees do. Agreeing on the diagnosis is the easy half. The same study found executives in toxic cultures about twice as likely to report strong growth - the number that lets a board decide the treatment can wait.

33%of chief executives describe their own workplace as toxic, up 25 points in a year

Businessolver with Edelman Data & Intelligence: 300 US C-suite executives and 1,000 employees across six industries, March to April 2026; 40% of employees said the same, up 18 points

What we would do about itEroding Trust
Before it happens
Trust and Appreciation every working morning, the chief executive answering the same two-minute question as everybody else. The gap between how a culture looks from the top and how it feels at the desk closes fastest when both are talking about the same thing on the same day.
After it has
Book Trust in Leadership for the team where the word toxic is already being used: ten short daily lessons over two working weeks on asking upward plainly and answering plainly, with two ten-minute debriefs its lead runs from a written guide. Each person chooses whether to take part, and the lead never sees what anybody writes.
What management sees
Engagement by team and by theme, read against your own first window rather than a benchmark - so the leader who suspects the culture has turned can see where, rather than guess. What anybody chose waits until enough have answered to hide each choice, and no screen shows an individual's.

Reported by Fair Play Talks (opens in a new tab)

An empty hospital corridor with teal waiting chairs along the wallHappening now

ITV News Anglia

6 October 2026

Medics allege 'toxic culture' at under-fire Addenbrooke's Hospital

The trust asked its own senior doctors, published what they said, then took the report down. Three in four described one pattern: raise a concern and you become the subject of one. The line that should worry a board is not the angry one - it is the doctor who has simply given up because nothing changes.

3/4senior doctors who took part described fear of speaking up, of what follows it, or doubt that anything would change

233 of the trust's 1,221 consultants and SAS doctors (19%), volunteering in an independent listening exercise in April and May 2026; of the 128 who answered the survey, 40% disagreed that they feel safe raising concerns

What we would do about itResistance to Feedback
Before it happens
Courage and Feedback every working morning, for the consultant and the porter alike: a two-minute question about what you do when something does not look right, asked on 250 days rather than once at induction. A habit of hearing is built long before the concern that tests it.
After it has
Book Welcoming Feedback for the departments where people have stopped raising things: ten short daily lessons over two working weeks on asking for the hard note and hearing it without punishing the person who brought it, with two ten-minute debriefs its lead runs. Each person chooses whether to take part, and nobody's answers reach the lead.
What management sees
Engagement by team and by theme, so the rooms that have gone quiet show before a review has to find them. What anybody chose waits until enough have answered to hide each choice, and no screen shows an individual's.

Reported by ITV News Anglia (opens in a new tab)

An open filing cabinet drawer packed with paper recordsHappening now

Computer Weekly

2 October 2026

UK data regulator restructures amid allegations of 'toxic' workplace culture

The UK's data regulator has a new name, a new board and a new Manchester headquarters. What it does not yet have is the independent review of its culture that ministers promised in July. Its staff union puts the question every reset has to answer: if it was never one bad apple, a new building is not a new culture.

What we would do about itPoor Leadership
Before it happens
Respect and Accountability as a question somebody answers on a Tuesday morning, for the board and the newest case officer alike. A culture that is talked about every working day is harder to leave unexamined until a resignation forces it.
After it has
Book Clear Direction for the teams the review will be about, while staff wait for it: ten short daily lessons over two working weeks on making direction clear from both ends, and two ten-minute debriefs its lead runs - nobody's answers reaching the lead, and little that competes with the review for anybody's calendar.
What management sees
Engagement by team and by theme from week one, so a new board is not waiting on a review to learn which rooms are worst. What anybody chose waits until enough have answered to hide each choice, and no screen shows an individual's.

Reported by Computer Weekly (opens in a new tab)

An empty chair at a desk in front of a window

HR Executive

31 August 2026

Workplace wellbeing: The awareness gap has closed. The execution gap persists

Awareness was never the bottleneck. Most of these organisations call burnout a strategic risk, and still nearly half have not made wellbeing anybody's actual job. What is missing is not belief but a mechanism - and a mechanism nobody owns is just the last person who cared, until they move team.

47%of organisations have no formal accountability for what leaders owe their people's wellbeing

i4cp's 2026 Holistic Well-Being Pulse Survey; 59% of organisations see burnout as a strategic risk, and only 36% rate their own organisation effective at supporting mental and emotional wellbeing

What we would do about itBurnout
Before it happens
Well-Being and Resilience as two minutes every working day, on a schedule nobody has to defend at the next budget round. The gap this survey measures is about mechanism rather than intent, and the reason a ritual closes it is unglamorous: it has no launch, no owner and nothing to remember. The initiative that needs somebody to keep organising it is always the one that quietly stops.
After it has
Book Energy That Lasts for a team already in it: ten short daily lessons over two working weeks on sustained pressure - noticing it, saying it, and easing it together - with two ten-minute debriefs its lead runs from a written guide. It works on the team's conditions and never diagnoses a person, and the lead sees that the team is doing it, never what anybody writes.
What management sees
Whether the mechanism is running, without a survey. Insights reads engagement, people taking part and landing well against the previous period of the same length rather than against a benchmark, per team and never per person, and what anybody chose waits until enough people have answered. That is the accountability 47% of these organisations say they do not have, in a form a board can actually be shown.

Reported by HR Executive (opens in a new tab)

A row of parked ambulances with a blue star of life on the nearest doorHappening now

Emergency Services Times

27 August 2026

With a focus on culture, staff and patients benefit from the WAST way in Wales

Real work, and as interesting for what they refused as for what they built - no competency framework, just three principles teams read locally. One thing is missing, as it is from almost every culture programme: a number showing what changed.

What we would do about itWorking in Silos
Before it happens
Essential Conversations is exactly right, and the hardest thing in any culture plan to keep alive - it depends on a manager choosing to start one. The daily insight does not: Communication and Respect arrive every working morning regardless.
After it has
Where a station or a shift has stopped talking to the next one, book it Working Across Teams: ten short daily lessons over two working weeks on what the rest of the service needs to know, and on asking across the line before deciding alone, with two ten-minute debriefs its lead runs. Each person chooses whether to take part, and nobody's answers reach the lead.
What management sees
The gap in this story. A programme this considered deserves a write-up with an outcome in it, and the reason there is none is that measuring culture usually means commissioning a survey. Engagement by team and theme is simply there from week one.

Reported by Emergency Services Times (opens in a new tab)

Electricity pylons across flat land at sunsetHappening now

Mirage News

25 August 2026

Independent Cultural Review Into Western Power

A new chief executive asked for it, the minister and board agreed the same week, and two of the country's most credible reviewers were appointed. This is what taking it seriously looks like - and 3,000 people still wait until early 2027.

3,000+employees whose workplace culture is now under independent review

Led by Kate Jenkins and Natasha de Silva; about six months, reporting publicly in early 2027

What we would do about itIncivility and Bullying
Before it happens
The daily insight is the thing that would already have been running for three years. Respect and Integrity every working morning, whole company, no facilitators and no calendar - which is why it can be in place long before anybody commissions a review.
After it has
Book Civility and Respect for the teams the review is about, while it runs: ten short daily lessons over two working weeks on the slights that escalate and on what a colleague can do about one, and two ten-minute debriefs its lead runs - little that competes with the review for anybody's calendar.
What management sees
Engagement by team and by theme from week one, so a board is not waiting six months to learn which rooms are worst. Training hours per employee in the shape GRI 404-1 and ESRS S1-13 ask for. What anybody chose waits until enough have answered to hide each choice, and no screen shows an individual's.

Reported by Mirage News (opens in a new tab)

A wall of old posters torn and peeling away in layers

HRreview

21 August 2026

Just 6% of employers see lasting change after tackling toxic behaviour, survey finds

This is the whole argument in one number. Forty-five per cent got the improvement and then watched it decay - which is not a finding about bad interventions, it is a finding about interventions. Anything that happens once decays.

6%of employers saw behaviour improve permanently after they intervened

WorkNest survey of 1,017 HR professionals and business leaders; 45% saw it improve and then come back

What we would do about itIncivility and Bullying
Before it happens
Two minutes a day is the dose this decay curve argues for. Distributed practice beating one massed session is among the most replicated results in learning research, across 317 experiments in one review (Cepeda and colleagues, 2006).
After it has
Book Civility and Respect for the team where it came back: ten short daily lessons over two working weeks, two ten-minute debriefs its lead runs, and check-ins after. When the course ends the daily insight is still running underneath it, which is the part a one-off intervention never has.
What management sees
Whether it held. Insights reads engagement, people taking part and landing well against the previous period of the same length rather than a benchmark, so the question a board actually asks - has this company moved, and has it stayed moved - is the one the page answers.

Reported by HRreview (opens in a new tab)

A man in a waistcoat holding a box of his belongings in an office

iHire, via PR Newswire

25 June 2026

iHire Releases 2026 Toxic Workplace Trends Report

Nearly seven in ten had worked somewhere toxic and 47.6% quit over it. Read the causes rather than the headline and it narrows usefully: this is not a workforce problem management must fix, it is a management problem the workforce is absorbing.

79.1%of people who met a toxic workplace blamed unethical, unaccountable or unsupportive management

1,220 US workers surveyed; 68.9% had worked for an employer they considered toxic

What we would do about itIncivility and Bullying
Before it happens
Respect and Accountability as a daily rep rather than an annual values refresh. The quiz asks your people nothing about their workplace, ever, which is exactly why what they do with it can be trusted as a signal.
After it has
Book Civility and Respect for the team in the story: ten short daily lessons over two working weeks on the put-downs that become normal, and on what a colleague can do when they see one, with two ten-minute debriefs its lead runs. Each person chooses whether to take part, and nobody's answers reach the lead.
What management sees
Which room has gone quiet, by team and by theme, never who. A toxic team does not file a complaint, it stops opening things - and that shows up here first.

Reported by iHire, via PR Newswire (opens in a new tab)

A laptop with a bright blank screen on a table in a lamp-lit room

Microsoft

5 May 2026

2026 Work Trend Index Annual Report: Agents, Human Agency, and the Opportunity for Every Organization

The largest AI study of the year went looking for what decides whether the investment lands, and it was not the model, the licence or the training budget. It was the culture around the person using it.

67%of reported AI impact is explained by culture, manager support and talent practices - against 32% by individual mindset

20,000 full-time knowledge workers across 10 markets

What we would do about itResistance to Change
Before it happens
Adaptability and Continuous Improvement kept warm daily rather than declared at a kickoff. This is the multivitamin argument at its cleanest: posture is what a habit holds and a workshop does not.
After it has
Book Change, One Step at a Time for the team the new tools are not landing with: ten short daily lessons over two working weeks on running one real change as small experiments, with the sceptics' objections treated as data, and two ten-minute debriefs its lead runs. Each person chooses whether to take part, and nobody's answers reach the lead.
What management sees
Theme drift by team: whether Adaptability is holding where you put the effort. Hours delivered and hours engaged side by side, never whichever flatters.

Reported by Microsoft (opens in a new tab)

A dim corridor lined with closed glass doors

Mental Health First Aid England

2 February 2026

The cost of workplace silence: Nearly half of employees feel unsafe speaking up at work, new research reveals

The last figure is the one for a board: 15% made a preventable mistake because raising it felt more dangerous than letting it happen. Silence is not a wellbeing line item here, it is an operational risk with a defect rate attached.

45%feel unable to raise a mistake or a risk at work

2,000 UK working adults; 15% said they had made a preventable mistake because they felt unsafe speaking up

What we would do about itBlame Culture
Before it happens
Courage and Trust, arriving before anything has gone wrong. A team asked to speak up for the first time during an incident has been asked to try something new on the worst possible day.
After it has
Book Learning from Mistakes for the team where mistakes go unsaid: ten short daily lessons over two working weeks on meeting a mistake with a question rather than a culprit, with two ten-minute debriefs its lead runs. Each person chooses whether to take part, and nobody's answers reach the lead.
What management sees
Engagement by team, beside the leaders' own quarterly read on whether the room changed. Where those two disagree is the finding worth having.

Reported by Mental Health First Aid England (opens in a new tab)

An empty meeting table with grey chairs beside tall windows and potted plants

Engage for Success

2026

Productivity Starts with People: Key Findings from the 2026 Engage for Success Annual Survey

Engage for Success asked whether leaders and managers put people issues first. Where staff saw both do it, engagement stood at 79%; where they saw neither, it was 50%, and more than a third of staff saw neither. The same report links command-and-control management with more stress and more people keeping quiet about problems, so the gap is less about perks than about how a manager runs the week.

79%engagement where staff see both leaders and managers put people issues first, against 50% where they see neither do

The EFS Engagement Index (satisfaction, loyalty and advocacy, averaged) from the 2026 annual survey with Nottingham Business School, of what the report calls a representative sample of the UK working population: 46% saw both leaders and managers prioritise people issues, 36% saw neither

What we would do about itPoor Leadership
Before it happens
Leadership & Coaching and Trust every working morning, for the manager and the team on the same two-minute question. The people side of the job comes up daily in small pieces, with no separate programme for an already busy manager to run.
After it has
Book Clear Direction for the team whose manager runs it by instruction: ten short daily lessons over two working weeks on making direction clear from both ends. The team practises asking what done looks like and saying it back; the lead practises the Coaching Kata's five questions and answering plainly, and runs two ten-minute debriefs from a written guide. Each person chooses whether to take part, and nobody's answers reach the lead.
What management sees
Engagement by team and by theme, each against the previous period of the same length, so the team where it is falling shows inside the company rather than in next year's national survey. What anybody chose waits until enough have answered to hide each choice, and no screen shows an individual's.

Reported by Engage for Success (opens in a new tab)

Rows of blue office cubicles under strip lights

Gallup

2026

State of the Global Workplace: 2026 Report

Global engagement fell to 20%, its lowest since 2020, at a cost Gallup puts near $10 trillion. The half nobody quotes is worse: the collapse is concentrated in managers, the exact people every culture programme is handed to for delivery.

22%of managers are engaged, down from 31% in 2022

141,444 employed respondents across more than 140 countries and territories

What we would do about itLow Morale
Before it happens
The lead gets the same two minutes as everybody else - no separate manager curriculum, no train-the-trainer week, nothing for an already-flat manager to prepare. Leadership & Coaching runs as the team's own theme.
After it has
Book A Motivated Team for the team that has gone flat: ten short daily lessons over two working weeks on what makes the work worth doing, and on the people it reaches. Its lead runs two ten-minute debriefs from a written guide, and each person chooses whether to take part.
What management sees
Insights, team by team: engagement, how many people are taking part and whether it is landing well, each against the previous period of the same length rather than a benchmark. A room going quiet shows months before an exit interview does.

Reported by Gallup (opens in a new tab)

Office towers in the City of London seen from street levelIn force from 1 September 2026

People Management

7 July 2025

FCA extends non-financial misconduct rules to 37,000 firms – what impact will it have on workplace culture and reporting?

Culture just stopped being a values poster and became a filing. Substantiated bullying and harassment now reach the regulator through the same door as financial misconduct.

37,000firms for whom bullying and harassment became a reportable regulatory matter

Every firm under the senior managers and certification regime, not only banks

What we would do about itIncivility and Bullying
Before it happens
Integrity, Respect and Accountability become a question somebody answers on a Tuesday morning rather than a slide in an induction deck, on all 250 working days rather than one. The conduct a firm can evidence to a regulator is the conduct it was working on before anybody asked.
After it has
Book Civility and Respect for the team where something is actually happening: ten short daily lessons over two working weeks on the slights and put-downs that escalate, and on what a colleague can do when they see one, with two ten-minute debriefs its lead runs. Each person chooses whether to take part, and the lead sees that the team is doing it, never anyone's answers.
What management sees
Engagement by team and by theme, plus training hours per employee in the shape GRI 404-1 and ESRS S1-13 ask for. What anybody chose waits until enough have answered to hide each choice, and no screen shows an individual's.

Reported by People Management (opens in a new tab)