One of the great challenges for organisations and companies of today is talent recruitment and retention. In today's highly mobile world, a young graduate or a capable manager can truly look upon the world as their oyster. Although in Asia, the primary concern of most employees remains financial: how much is the pay and what are the perks of the job? Yet increasingly, employees are also concerned about questions of the organisation's culture.
Corporate culture is not something many Asian businesses pay much attention to. There are many reasons for it. Corporate culture is often associated with something that is nebulous and uncertain, and most Asian businesses believe that there is only one kind of corporate culture that is acceptable, and that is old-fashioned hard work. But in an age when good help has never been harder to get, having the right corporate culture in your organisation vs not having any at all, could be the difference between your business or organisation being a great success or a begrudging success with never-ending staff problems.
Today's Gen X and Y employees are concerned about the paycheque, work-life balance AND the corporate culture environment of their workplace. There is an increasing reluctance to work in organisations with toxic organisational politics, dog-eat-dog management practices, or which are dull and uninspiring.
What's all this got to do with Feng Shui? Feng Shui not only has a distinct influence on the corporate culture and environment of an organisation, but can also be use to improve or alter the culture and environment of an organization for the better. Of course, the converse also applies. The Feng Shui of a building or office can actually cause the transformation of an organisation's culture from positive to negative.
Feng Shui consultants who work on residential Feng Shui know that the Feng Shui of a home greatly influences the mindset, thinking and emotional state of the occupants. As such, the Feng Shui of an office, where most people spend anywhere between 6-10 hours of their time, five days a week, will obviously also influence the mindset, thinking and emotional state of the person who works there.
When it comes to corporate culture and environment, the focus of the Feng Shui consultant is usually the structure of the building and also the internal layout of the office. Although the landforms (water and mountains) are also relevant, the environment and behaviour of individuals within the organisation tends to be a little bit more influenced by the building and office itself.
The Case of Apple Inc.
A company that produces uber-cool products must have a certain unique corporate culture and environment. The late Apple founder Steve Jobs is said to have pioneered the casual work environment in Silicon Valley. At Apple, the dress code is casual, but the work ethnic is intense, with employees often spending a little too much time at their jobs. Steve Jobs was known for walking around the office in barefoot, even after the company became a Fortune 500 company. The Google map image above of the Apple HQ at 1 Infinite Loop tells us just how the Feng Shui of the organisation has enabled it to become the hip, cool company that employees associate with "challenges and cool projects".
The structure of the cluster of buildings on the campus is a combination of a square and round shapes. In fact, it looks like a computer mouse. Within the cluster are both square and round buildings. There is an open courtyard in the center. In Metaphysics, square is the element of Earth, and represented by the trigram Kun. Round and oval shapes are the element of Metal, and governed by the trigram Qian. Kun-Qian forms the Earth-Heaven Unity Hexagram, which is regarded as one of the best of the 64 Yi Jing Hexagrams, and it denotes intense loyalty, great unity, harmony and altruistic spirit. These very much are in-line with the way Apple employees have described their workplace environment, describing it is "collegial". The Main Door is located at the Shen (Monkey) sector when the 24 Mountains are super-imposed over the structure. The Monkey is one of the 4 Growth Branches, and is associated with forward-thinking, young, robust, energetic and adventurous qualities. Hence this gives Apple the ability to create products that are forward-thinking, almost futuristic, as well as being exciting and cool.
Next month we will talk about what kind of Corporate Culture does your organisation has.
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