I was doing some running around yesterday and was driving behind a truck marked with the company’s information. Predominately displayed were the company’s logo, name, contact information, and a few promotional comments. Sounds normal and appropriate, right?

Well after noticing the imaging on the truck, a disposable coffee cup and lid came flying out of the driver-side window. While there are many issues with this scenario, the biggest one is that this is a company that promotes itself as ‘green.’

This is a prime example of marketing and brand imagery simply being words and images on paper or in this case, a truck. A company is responsible for the message, perception, and images that it projects. While the market has the freedom to interpret these based on what message is communicated and how.

Now after seeing this, do you really think that I believe this company is ‘green?’ Promoting the green label may provide you an increase of leads, but actions like this one are going to cause the market to question your ability to be honest.

It’s interesting listening to how people describe the culture of a company. Often a company’s culture is talked about as either this thing that can be held and is separate from the company or it is something so touchy-feely that the average person really doesn’t want to hear about it. When you take it to either extreme, I don’t blame companies that shun the culture concept.

A company’s culture is not separate from the company. It is not something that you can physically hold or touch. But it is felt and believed. Like a person’s heart, the culture is how a company operates, thrives, survives or fails (life). While you cannot separate a culture from the company, nor can you produce an exact replica.

The culture of a company is the driving force to how everything gets done. It influences how your employees make decisions, how processes are established and put into place, what policies (above the legally required ones) are needed, and how the company presents itself to the market.