Workplace culture is shaped by small daily messages, executive says

TORONTO — Workplace culture is shaped more by small daily messages than by formal plans or retreats, a Toronto executive says.

"It's actually a mistake for employers and leaders to think that they can rely on strategic plans or websites or annual retreats or anything of that nature to see culture form because employees experience culture in smaller everyday moments," said Jason Murray, founder, president and managing partner of BES Executive Search.

He says this is increasingly important as more communication happens through screens.

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"We don't pick up the phone these days to actually call people to hear tone and intention and emotion," he said.

Without those cues, employees are left to interpret the words in front of them.

Murray says leaders can improve that experience by being more intentional with their language.

Short messages aren't necessarily bad, but he suggests adding context. Instead of asking "Do you have a moment to speak?" he recommends adding the topic, like "Do you have a moment to speak about the project that we're working on together?"

That small addition means people know what to expect instead of "filling in the storyboard for themselves," he said.

Leaders should also reconsider language that creates unnecessary urgency.

Words such as "ASAP," "now" and "priority" can immediately put employees on alert, Murray says.

"Too often we think everything is critical, everything is red alert, everything is an emergency," he said.

Before hitting send, he suggests considering whether the request actually warrants that urgency.

If being more thoughtful about every email or Slack message sounds time-consuming, he says slowing down is okay and that intentional communication becomes more efficient with practice.

It can also become part of a leader's professional identity.

Murray tries to bring personality to his writing, using his messages to add levity to an employee's day.

He says some employees have even told him they look forward to receiving his emails because they feel like they'll get something from them.

Even the way he ends his emails is intentional, signing off each message with "Create a great day."

"It's the last way that I'm communicating, which means that it's going to have people feeling a particular way at the end of the email," he said.

Culture may be discussed at annual retreats, but employees experience it every day, sometimes in something as small as the words at the bottom of an email.

Artificial intelligence is making it increasingly important for leaders to protect and develop the distinctly human capabilities of creativity, curiosity and collaborative thinking, according to HP's 2026 Work Relationship Index.

The challenge is that creativity can weaken when people rely too heavily on familiar perspectives or limited forms of interaction.

Marilyne Crépeau and Mike James Ross, consultants from leadership advisory firm Egon Zehnder, advise leaders to deliberately seek diverse perspectives and in-person collaboration, while creating psychological safety so people feel comfortable challenging ideas, experimenting, failing and pivoting quickly.

Surrounding yourself with people who think differently and engaging with them face-to-face can generate stronger ideas by exposing you to perspectives and non-verbal cues that may be missed virtually.

A Wall Street Journal article looks at how consuming large amounts of AI-generated content may be changing the way people communicate, with some increasingly adopting "prompt speak" and other writing and speech patterns commonly used by large language models.

"I will catch myself when I'm writing where I'm like, 'Oh my God, I shouldn't have even written that. I should have just let AI do it because it sounds the same," said Will Barnett, head of recruiting for a California startup. "It's trained me to be more like it, instead of the reverse."

With files from The Globe and Mail