Nope, said 65 percent of those responding, that kind of approach doesn't work with culture.

If the change masters throw too many changes, change orders and change objectives at staff with deadlines that are too tight and without good tools to implement the changes, the group collectively becomes exhausted and the initiative collapses. Any progress made during the cultural change process is usually lost, they reported to Booz, and everyone winds up feeling worse than before the process began.

Very few of the respondents doubted the significance of their company's culture.

Eighty-four percent of all respondents, and 86 percent of C-Suiters, called it "critically important."

But less than half said their employer did a good job managing culture and the same percentage don't really believe that management ranks culture and cultural change as a strategic priority.

And the foot soldiers of industry reported that their opinion and input isn't generally sought by management when cultural change initiatives are planned. As a result, the workforce often doesn't understand what they're being asked to change (44 percent) or they flat-out disagree with the objectives (38 percent).

The other side of a business's culture is the business of culture. The Booz survey indicated that too often companies leave culture out of the equation when seeking some sort of transformative change apart from changing culture.

With the IT system example, here's an initiative fail waiting to happen: A company's culture is highly social, but the new system comes with firewalls made of kryptonite and will deny access to many social media platforms. Or the reverse: A healthcare company's culture is one driven by HIPAA privacy concerns, and the new PR initiative demands that everyone's contacts be merged into one giant newsletter list.

The Booz study suggests that culture is a more powerful factor in any kind of change than employers recognize.

Want proof?

Ninety-six percent of respondents said their culture was in need of "some change," and 51 percent said it needed "a major overhaul." But just 45 percent said culture was being "effectively managed" by their employer.

Booz's suggestion is that company culture should be given the opportunity "to evolve … so that it can be used as more of a change lever and, in some cases, to have culture lead the transformation."  

Booz isn't sure exactly how this should be accomplished. But by identifying the critical role culture plays in change and, by extension, success, the study might well represent a starting point for action.