Financial results are a downstream outcome. The true upstream driver is a company's culture—its talent density, hiring practices, and incentive systems. A strong culture creates a reinforcing feedback loop that attracts talent, improves decisions, and fuels compounding for decades.

When Tubulus pivoted its lead program from liquid to solid tumors, the team's ability to change direction instantly stemmed directly from the company's foundational culture of trust. Openly explaining the rationale behind major strategic decisions allows employees to follow and execute without friction, even on a dime.

As a company grows, new hires lack the context of early struggles. To preserve the original culture, formally document and share stories of early failures, pivots, and near-death experiences during onboarding. This reminds everyone of the core principles that led to success.

A biotech transitioning from a small, 'fit-for-purpose' R&D team to a large commercial organization gets a rare chance to create a new culture. Madrigal treated its rapid growth from ~100 to over 500 people as an opportunity to establish fresh core values for the newly-formed enterprise.

Culture isn't an abstract value statement. It's the sum of concrete behaviors you enforce, like fining partners for being late to meetings. These specific actions, not words, define your organization's true character and priorities.

Instead of asking "what culture do we want?", BBDO asked "what are the characteristics of people who do best here?". This approach reverse-engineers a culture based on proven success, creating a practical and authentic behavioral language for the entire organization.

Instead of vague values, define culture as a concrete set of "if-then" statements that govern reinforcement (e.g., "IF you are on time, THEN you are respected"). This turns an abstract concept into an operational system that can be explicitly taught, managed, and improved across the organization.

Developing a new medicine is 'the toughest team sport,' requiring hundreds of people across diverse disciplines over many years. In this context, culture isn't a perk; it's the fundamental 'glue' that enables these disparate teams to work in concert and succeed. Without it, even the best individual players will fail.

To prevent values from being just words on a wall, create a running list of specific, concrete anecdotes where employees demonstrated a value in action. This makes the culture tangible, tracks adoption, highlights who is truly living the values, and provides a clear model for others to follow.