The Culture Journey
Our Journey
The USC Culture Journey is a university-wide initiative to align the Trojan community around the values that unite us, work on demonstrating behaviors that bring those values to life, and develop opportunities to improve our systems and processes. Together, we are shaping our culture.
Milestones
Since October 2019, tens of thousands of Trojans – faculty, staff, students, governing bodies, deans and unit leaders – have shared their voices and provided feedback on our unifying values, aligned behaviors, and what actions should be taken to enhance our culture. To learn more about the origins of our Culture Journey, take a look at some of our key milestones.
Ongoing Commitment
We call this work on USC’s culture a Culture Journey because we want to acknowledge that culture is not a “one and done” matter. Our Unifying Values give us a compass that helps guide us along this ongoing process of collective self-examination, improvement, and renewal.
Our Culture Survey took place in early 2024 as a way for us to hear from students, faculty and staff about community perceptions of and experiences with our institutional culture. It was the first large-scale feedback collection effort on culture since the 2019 Values Poll, and the purpose of the survey is for us to learn the extent to which our community-defined Six Unifying Values are being lived out at USC. The survey results will be used to engage the Trojan community about how we will continue to support and initiate positive culture change. This includes plans to:
Hold University-wide and School/Unit-specific Report-Back sessions in summer/fall 2024 to inform stakeholders (staff, faculty and students) about the results of the survey.
Hold University-wide and School/Unit-specific Discussion Sessions in summer/fall 2024 to solicit feedback from stakeholders (staff, faculty and students) about action planning and next steps to address issues and opportunities coming out of the survey responses.
Regularly collect updates and information about initiatives underway throughout the university to make culture improvements in alignment with our values, and facilitate knowledge-sharing so everyone in the Trojan community can stay updated on progress and learn from each other.
Continue issuing Culture Journey newsletters to subscribers six times per year, and hosting culture-focused community events throughout the year.
Continue providing opportunities for Culture Network members to access resources to help support positive culture change, and connect across silos to share experience and best practices for being champions and role models of putting our Unifying Values into action.
Roll out another Culture Report at the end of 2025 to update the community on progress since the 2024 survey and subsequent action planning. This is an important step that demonstrates our values of Accountability and Open Communication.