Why it matters
Culture shows up as speed. How long simple decisions, opportunities and values concerns take to travel through the organisation reveals more about how it really works than any survey.
How to run it
- Decision speed: time a simple, low-risk request from start to finish. Hours is healthy; weeks is broken.
- Opportunity routing: time how long a new opportunity takes to reach the right owner with a next step scheduled.
- Values response: time how long it takes from a concern being raised to the person hearing a specific outcome.
- Sample for 4–6 weeks: about 10 decisions, 6 opportunities and 3 values cases.
- Review: look at the typical time and the slowest 10%, plus handoffs and stalls.
- Publish the results internally, fix the slowest signal, and re-measure next quarter.
Watch out for
- Measuring without publishing — transparency is part of the fix
- Trying to fix all three at once instead of the slowest
When not to use it
Values cases are sensitive — record timings only, never personal details.
