Culture Eats Training for Breakfast—Here’s What You Can Do
You’ve invested in a powerful training program. The content is relevant, the facilitator engaging, and the feedback glowing. But three months down the line—nothing’s changed. Sound familiar?
This is where Peter Drucker’s famous quote hits home: “Culture eats strategy for breakfast.” We’d go one step further and say—it eats training for breakfast too.
Why Training Alone Doesn’t Stick
Training is often seen as a silver bullet. But no matter how well-designed a program is, it can’t thrive in a culture that doesn’t support growth, learning, or change. Employees return from sessions recharged and enthusiastic—only to find that back at their desks, the same bottlenecks, resistance, and behaviors remain.
This disconnect isn’t a failure of training—it’s a culture issue.
Here’s What Culture Does to Learning:
- Reinforces or erodes new behavior: If your manager doesn’t support what you’ve learned, chances are, you’ll revert to your old ways.
- Signals what’s really valued: If collaboration is trained but competition is rewarded, learning loses credibility.
- Influences psychological safety: No one speaks up in a training on feedback if your team doesn’t feel safe doing so at work.
So What Can You Do?
- Start with Leadership Alignment:
Before training begins, ensure leaders are bought in—not just as attendees, but as champions of change. Culture flows from the top. - Integrate Learning into Daily Work:
Don’t let learning be a one-off event. Reinforce concepts through team huddles, performance reviews, and everyday conversations. - Create Space for Practice:
Culture shifts when new behaviors are consistently modeled and rewarded. Offer opportunities to apply learning, fail safely, and iterate. - Diagnose Cultural Blocks Early:
At Mosaic, our Discover phase helps identify cultural gaps that might block learning, so training doesn’t get lost in translation.
Bottom Line
Training is only as powerful as the culture it lives in. Want it to stick? Build the cultural scaffolding that supports, sustains, and celebrates learning.