New requirements for the psychosocial work environment: Why dialogue matters more than ever
Eirin Eriksen Horvei
October 14, 2026
“We live in uncertain times, and I am sure that innovation will be central in the coming parliamentary term. I hope and believe that the new Storting will work for an innovative Norway. We are going to need it!” This statement was made by the President of the Storting, Masud Gharahkhani, at the opening of the new parliamentary term in 2025.
The statement is very much in line with what we are hearing from the business community, where developing a dynamic, innovative and learning culture is high on the list. This is reflected in the fact that more and more people are being appointed to HR positions with “culture” as part of the title – typically “People & Culture”. At the same time, Gartner's “HR priorities 2024-2025” report that 47% of HR leaders do not know how to drive change to achieve the desired culture.
Culture develops whether we like it or not, but it can be influenced. That is why we need culture agents.
A culture agent is nothing new. In the mid-1990s, I was part of a large merger between two big steel companies characterised by traditional industry and several nationalities with different cultures. I was lucky enough to be part of the division that had internal culture agents, albeit under a different name. They brought with them a set of simple tools and a shared understanding of what it takes to create an effective organisation where employees are doing well. At first, we had frequent meetings, always with a culture agent as facilitator. Among other things, we learned to end every meeting by asking whether anyone was left with any concerns. I can really recommend it, because it often turned out to be the most valuable part of the meeting.
The agents trained us in using simple methods and tools that we took back to our own organisation and quickly benefited from. Especially in our work on continuous improvement, we found that a lot of “bad culture” was replaced by motivation and engagement when we invited people to a shared effort. Much thanks to the agents' contribution, our division developed a culture that helped implement the company's strategy much faster than the other divisions.
A culture agent does not need to be a full-time position, nor does it have to be linked to the HR role. The most important thing is that the agent understands their role as a facilitator of culture development. They should be a facilitator who supports other people's processes. This means it is best not to have too strong an ownership of the issues, because then you easily become part of the discussions yourself and lose the overview.
The culture agent of 1995 would probably need new competence to handle today's context. We solve complex tasks that require more collaboration. We have higher levels of competence and higher expectations of autonomy and influence. But the most important thing is the change in how competence is developed.
In the past, strategic competence management worked well, with the aim of giving employees the competence they need to do their job. Development is managed from the top with competence requirements that support the strategy, and matrices are used to document knowledge and set goals for training needs in the form of gap analyses. The common feature is the reuse of already known knowledge.
Now, more and more competence development happens on people's own initiative, and we do not know in advance what competence we will need. The need for new knowledge arises along the way in the work situation, and competence is developed through reflection and action while the tasks are being carried out. This type of learning can end up “without aim or purpose” if we are not conscious of having a framework that provides opportunity and direction for dynamic competence development. The most important elements of the framework are that we get relevant information and an understanding of the overall goals, a good learning climate, sufficient time, and that learning is led with support from management.
• How to facilitate.
• Basic knowledge of organisational culture.
• The drivers that support the development of a dynamic, learning organisational culture, and how to work on developing them.
• How to deal with resistance to change. Read the article "Competence management in times of change" here.
Then the course "Culture development in practice – become a culture agent" might be for you!
In just 2 days, you get a practical course that gives you the tools you need to understand and develop a dynamic, learning culture. (The course is held in Norwegian.)
More info and registration here.
