Recently a client who is about a year into a complex merger and acquistion asked how he could inject the corporate DNA of his culture into that of the acquired company. Cultural DNA is a fashionable concept at the moment, although no-one seems to be entirely sure exactly what it means.

I asked my client if he had a sample of the DNA that could be injected, and he confessed that he didn’t.  We then had an extended conversation about how he might isolate and extract his culture’s DNA, and what he described was his culture’s unique identity, particularly the more unconscious aspects of it.

The idea of being able simply inject DNA into an organism suggests a variety of processes like genetic engineering, genetic modification and virus replication. However, these are dubious practices that are often detrimental to both the injector and the host.

In the natural world, evolution does not take place by gene injection. DNA usually adapts and evolves in response to environmental stimuli, so to change the DNA of an organisation, you need to change the space that it operates in, rather than trying to invasively assert some vague corporate identity.