Ashley Byrne: 'Culture is Something I Work on Every Day'

Associate Director, Corus Byrnes Dental Laboratory,
Wheatley, England; 46 employees

LMT: How would your team describe your culture and how is it consistently reinforced?

Byrne: They would likely describe it as relaxed but driven, fun but hardworking, empowering and united by a shared mission to change dentistry for the better. Culture is something I work on every single day. It’s a living thing. Take your eye off it for too long and it can fade quickly.

One of the ways we reinforce our culture is via our flat management structure; we don’t have a hierarchy, meaning there are no traditional managers. Instead, we have team leaders whose primary role is to advance and develop their people, rather than manage them. In a traditional structure, managers tend to fear being out-skilled because they worry it threatens their jobs. Leaders, however, embrace it; they push individuals...