The Commerce of Culture: Driving Cross-Functional Revenue Growth

Recently, a new hire shared feedback that stuck with me. During one of their first calls, they were reminded to turn on their camera. When we spoke after the meeting, they explained that it felt like forced fun, something imposed rather than invited.

I understood the reaction. But what was missing in that moment was the why. Fun aside, turning cameras on is about building strong connections and a sense of community. When both of these are built consistently and with intention, you create the perfect conditions for collaboration and, ultimately, growth.

That's what most organizations miss about culture. In many siloed businesses, participating in company culture is considered a soft skill. But I think it is much more than that. What I’ve found is that when businesses treat team collaboration and culture like other high-value strategic capabilities, it is one of the best ways to drive revenue.

When Collaboration Becomes a Revenue Driver

Argano is an organization built from 28 companies. That kind of growth doesn't automatically produce a unified culture, regardless of your industry. What it produces, if you're not deliberate, is a collection of legacy identities held together by an org chart.

People stay loyal to the companies they came from, protective of the clients and relationships they've always served. In organizations built through acquisition, it's also common for people to feel more connected to their legacy company than to the larger organization, and that loyalty, while understandable, can quietly work against growth.

So the real work of integration is getting your team to internalize the idea that your success is my success. When that mindset takes hold, not as a value on an inspirational poster but as a way of working, collaboration stops being a social behavior. Instead, it starts showing up in cross-sell activity, integrated solution planning, and clients who experience one unified team rather than a handoff between separate groups.

How the Shift Actually Happens

It’s important to remember that this shift doesn't happen overnight. When it does show up, it usually starts in the language. In our case, people stop referring to their legacy company and start talking about Argano as a whole.

Eventually, this leads to employees pulling people from different departments into conversations. They show genuine curiosity about what other teams do and how those capabilities might serve a client they're already working with. Conversations become less about boundaries and more about how we're working together to solve client challenges.

That's why I design culture initiatives that go beyond bringing people together. They're built to help people understand what their colleagues actually do. Win stories that show how different teams collaborated on a client engagement. Lunch and learns. Shared go-to-market calls where cross-business plays get visibility. Recognition that signals publicly that collaboration is how we operate, not just something we talk about. Leadership engagement is critical. When leaders actively support and talk about these behaviors, it reinforces the fact that this is how we serve clients and grow as a business.

The goal isn't to manufacture enthusiasm. Instead, it's to build enough familiarity that when someone is in a client conversation, they naturally think, “I know who can help with this.” In my experience, when people understand what a colleague actually does and what challenges they solve, it becomes much easier to recognize the opportunity and make the connection.

Measuring What Actually Matters

The indicators we pay closest attention to are commercial. What percentage of our pipeline involves multiple teams? Which departments are actively introducing other parts of the platform to their clients? Are we seeing broader, more integrated deals over time?

If you can't connect what you're doing to results, it's hard to sustain investment in it. That's true anywhere in the business, and it's just as true in culture. Working alongside leaders who consistently looked to data to understand outcomes shaped how I think about this, and that habit hasn't changed.

These numbers tell you whether culture is influencing how people actually work, or just how they feel about working. And that distinction is important, especially as organizations scale and the pressure to justify cultural investment continues to grow.

Sentiment data also matters; I don't want that to get lost here. High engagement is a real driver of performance, and it can help you understand whether people feel connected and aligned. But sentiment alone isn't the real test of whether culture leads to revenue growth.

Intentional by Design

That camera-on policy I opened with is just one thread in a much larger fabric, designed to build the relationships that lead to trust, collaboration, and results. Most people won't trace it back that far, and they don't need to. What matters is that as leaders, we understand the through line and design for it consistently across everything we do — communications, recognition, how wins get celebrated, how goals get set.

When people begin to see how their actions contribute to client outcomes and company growth, something changes. Instead of being something you invest in separately, culture becomes part of how the business succeeds.

 

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