Episode 29: Culture is the game — IBM vs Polaroid
Published on 22 April 2025 • Hosted by Dr Lisa Colledge
In the early 1990s, two brilliant technology companies faced the same storm: IBM and Polaroid. Both were filled with visionary minds and strong track records of leading their fields through innovation. Both were being disrupted by fast-moving change. But their outcomes couldn’t have been more different.
Polaroid had invented a high-resolution digital camera. It could have been their future. But their culture rejected it. Their founder Edwin Land had built a team in his own image—brilliant, loyal, committed to his vision. Unfortunately, that vision didn’t include virtual photographs. Dissent was unwelcome, and the prototype was shelved. Their culture became a trap.
IBM, too, was in crisis—losing billions, paralyzed by turf wars, and struggling to act as one company. But Louis Gerstner Junior saw what many leaders miss: the problem wasn’t that IBM lacked talent. It was that their people couldn’t think together.
He didn’t come in with a grand technology plan. Instead, he shifted the culture. He bet on the brilliance already inside the organization and focused on behaviour change. His mantra? Win. Execute. Team. It wasn’t a how-to. It was a why-it-matters.
By enabling collaboration across cognitive styles—outcome-focused implementers with abstract thinkers, data-driven analysts with intuition-led relationship builders—IBM transformed. Resilience, not just innovation, became their strength.
The result? IBM’s market capitalization soared. And more importantly, the culture stuck.
So here’s the lesson for people building up teams: culture is not a vibe or a perk. It’s your infrastructure. Your capability for resilience. Especially in a world of disruption, you don’t just need diverse thinking—you need a culture that knows how to use it.
Culture isn’t just one aspect of the game—it is the game.
I'm Lisa, and I take inspiration from neurodivergence-inclusion to help leaders create cognitively inclusive cultures that connect people with different cognitive styles, empowering everyone to contribute their best.
If you'd like to learn more about how prioritizing this single program would help you to boost not only engagement and wellbeing, but also innovation and resilience, please take a look at my free signature program: Neuro-Inspired: 12 Steps to a Future-Proof Workplace Culture.
