You Can’t Challenge the Status Quo with a Culture Built To Maintain It.

Imagining what’s possible means looking beyond what’s accepted. We help mission-driven non-profits and founder-led ventures forge cultures that inspire action, adapt to change, and unlock their people’s potential—redefining what it means to ‘fit-in’.

Forge A Better Tomorrow—Starting With Your Own Culture. Book A Call Today:

Proudly Serving Real Change-Makers By Helping Them Embrace Real Change:

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Causes Suffer—When Cultures Work Against Them.

Causes emerge when the societal rules we rely on fail, leaving gaps. Your organization exists to fill gaps you can’t bear to see ignored.

So what happens to your cause—when the culture meant to sustain the organization advancing it—operates using those same flawed rules?

Core Values Offer Little Value

You try to align your culture using core values - only to find they’re too vague to guide decisions and shape behaviour.

People must see the difference between what society deems 'good' and what’s essential to your cause. This contrast reveals the choices behind their actions, helping them account for those actions, aligning future choices with your mission.

Clarity Becomes Crippling

You craft a crystal-clear vision, mission, and values—only for that clarity to spark fear, paralyzing your team.

Why? Because clarity forces people to confront change. The clearer the goal, the more people see what they must leave behind, and the scarier it feels to move forward. Without the tools to help people adapt, clarity can create more risk than uncertainty ever could.

Personality Becomes ‘Personal’

Personality tests are often used to guide teams through change. But labeling people with fixed traits can backfire—making feedback feel like a personal attack, causing defensiveness that blocks growth.

Labels discourage change when people stop seeing themselves as adaptable, allowing trust within teams to break down. Teaching people to use their traits to alter their states empowers them to adapt, empathize, and thrive.

Leaders Begin Lagging

Key people embrace change, challenging their leaders to follow—only to see those leaders unintentionally become barriers.

Leaders can’t turn off their influence. Under pressure, even the best of us rely on authority to regain control, often without realizing the cost. Teaching leaders to use their influence to lift others helps teams stay focused and connected, no matter what they’re facing.

Risk Multiplies Each Time You Add

You finally build a culture worthy of your cause—and put it at risk each time someone new joins.

Each new team member nearly doubles the bonds of trust needed to hold the team together. Hiring for skills alone doesn’t protect that trust. To grow without eroding what you’ve built, culture fit and team cohesion must come first.

We built the CultureSmith system to fix these problems right the first time because we’ve seen how each failed attempt escalates them into costly, exhausting patterns.

It’s time to set aside the inspirational quotes and one-time workshops whose impact fades in weeks. To influence real change, your culture needs:

Clarity that turns emotion into focused action.

Tools that help people embrace change with confidence.

Leaders equipped to build trust and adaptability at scale.

Hiring practices that put culture over credentials.

Curious How Well Your Team Can Embrace Change?

Get an accurate read on your culture in minutes. Take the free 16-question Organizational Intelligence Assessment to gain clarity, insight and actionable steps without;

Fear of what you may uncover.
Confusion over what to do next.
Any obligation to work with us.

Why CultureSmith

Why The Name CultureSmith?

Think of what a blacksmith can do with scrap metal or what a wordsmith can do with random words. Both transform something raw into something extraordinary. We do the same with workplace stress, shaping it into growth and wellbeing. But why we do this—and why it may matter to you—are even bigger ‘whys’.

Why We ‘CultureSmith’

In 2014, our CEO’s then 8-year old daughter gave this 360 review, and it changed everything. He realized how clinging to society’s idea of what a leader should be, ignoring emotional intelligence, and not seeing how his influence made others feel small—was affecting those who mattered most.

That wake-up call sparked a mission to turn culture into a tool that brings out the best in people once we realized how common his story was.

Why You Should ‘CultureSmith’

The clearest proof of this is how teams handle feedback. Think about the last time you knew you should give someone feedback—only to talk yourself out of it. Why?

Because giving feedback stirs up emotions, and society teaches us that’s risky. Research shows we avoid giving feedback—even when it’s positive—despite knowing how much people crave it. The problem isn’t feedback—it’s starting conversations that make us vulnerable.

When feedback is silenced, no one wins. Not the team. Not the person who needs it. And not the person who avoids it.

It’s a common problem that needs an uncommon solution—one that creates the space and capacity for people to face their emotions and learn to work through them. We create these spaces and build this capacity through four core services designed with purpose:

Forging Uncommon Culture

A blacksmith uses precision to shape raw metal into useful tools. A wordsmith uses structure to craft raw ideas into meaning. We help you forge a culture so unique that it inspires people to adapt—aligning their choices and actions with your mission.

Forging Uncommon Capacity

Intelligence is defined as 'the capacity to build capacity.' A blacksmith uses heat to expand metal’s capacity to bend. A wordsmith uses clarity to expand a message’s capacity to create understanding. We use emotional, social, relational, and adaptive intelligences to expand your people’s capacity to adapt.

Forging Uncommon Leadership

A blacksmith uses pressure to refine metal, making it stronger and more durable. A wordsmith limits words, knowing fewer, well-chosen ones create impact. Leaders under pressure often rely on rules and authority to drive results. We help them guide under pressure, turning stress into strength and delivering results without sacrificing trust.

Hire-Integrity

Integrity means strength. Blacksmithing produces the highest-integrity tools at the lightest possible weight. Word-smithing makes every word serve a purpose, creating clarity and brevity. We strengthen your culture’s integrity with every hire by making culture - not skills or experience- the benchmark. The result? Nimble, cohesive teams that multiply their strength with every person added—where new hires make your existing employees even better.

A blacksmith forges strength from fire. A wordsmith forges meaning from words. We forge wellbeing from workplaces - and we’re inviting you to join us.

Work isn’t why so many struggle to connect to their emotions. But it’s the only lever big enough to create real change. We’ll improve your culture—but we’ll also help send the best version of your people home every day.

If you’re ready to embrace change—while helping us create it—take the uncommon first step of booking a Discovery Call right now.

Frequently Asked Questions:

How much does this cost?

We tailor pricing based on the size of your team, how quickly you need change, and the areas you want to improve—culture, leadership, hiring, or all three.

What we can tell you is the cost of doing nothing. Each disengaged employees creates roughly $23,800 in waste each year. Replacing a problem employee can cost up to 213% of their salary—excluding recruitment fees.

For most firms—re-engaging two people, or preventing the turnover of only one—generates positive ROI on the investment made.

We can also tell you we’ll help far more than two people.
Do you only work with non-profits and start-ups?
What if my team resists change?

Resistance to change is normal—and it’s often what created the problem that has you considering us. Not addressing this resistance only lets the problem grow. Who better to help your team move forward than experts who deeply understand the psychology of change and the fear that underpins resistance?

That’s why we train your team in each of emotional, social, relational, and adaptive intelligence. These skills make it easier for people to move through uncertainty and embrace new ways of working.

The result? A team that thrives under pressure and adapts with confidence.
What is the average length of a commitment?

For those who commit to the entire CultureSmith process - you can expect to be working with us for anywhere from 6-18 months depending on the amount of growth and change you face externally while going through the process.

However, each of our services can be structured into a “CultureSprint” - a 30-90 day intensive program designed to deliver a specific, targeted change.

Many of our long-term clients return for “CultureSprints” each time they reach a new plateau in their growth.
We’ve tried coaches and consultants before. The sessions are great, but the results don’t stick. How is this different?

Most coaches and consultants work on surface-level fixes and stop at delivering great sessions. We go deeper.

Our programs are designed by master’s-level organizational psychologists, and we’re the only framework that builds emotional intelligence into everything we do. Emotional intelligence is what drives sustainable change, making our success rate higher than traditional methods.

Unlike transactional consultants who focus on workshops, we embed with our clients. Our mission isn’t to inspire you—it’s to make real change happen alongside you, ensuring results stick long after the sessions are over.
Does my team or I need any advanced training or knowledge to do this?

No. Our entire claim to fame is taking complex, abstract concepts and making them understandable for everyone.

That’s why organizations like yours choose us.

We know this works because we were founders who struggled with culture and became experts through solving our own problems. Empathy is built into everything we do, and we meet you and your team exactly where you are to ensure the process is simple and effective.
Are your services delivered online or in-person?
How would you explain CultureSmith to a 5-year-old?
- CultureSmith overall: We help teams work better together by teaching people how to understand and help each other. It’s like putting puzzle pieces together to make a beautiful picture.
- Forging Uncommon Culture: We help teams find rules they all agree on so everyone knows what to do and feels like they belong.
- Forging Uncommon Capacity: We help people learn new skills so they can work better with others, even when things are hard.
- Forging Uncommon Leadership: We help team leaders take care of their team, like a coach who helps everyone play their best.
- Hire-Integrity: We help teams find new players who make the team even stronger and help everyone feel happy working together.