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In this episode of Quest Global’s Horizons podcast, hosted by Elisha Meador (Senior Project Coordinator), Courtney Headley (Global Head of Culture), and Dushyanth (Dushy) Reddy (Global Business Head, Semiconductors) explore cultural debt and its impact on organizational sustainability. Drawing parallels with financial debt, they define cultural debt as the accumulation of compromises that occur when leaders prioritize short-term metrics over long-term cultural health, such as avoiding feedback conversations or hiring for technical skills while overlooking cultural fit. These shortcuts compound over time, leading to misaligned teams, reduced engagement, and hindering business performance and organizational longevity.
The conversation covers strategies for measuring and managing cultural health, including analyzing language patterns in meetings, examining goal-setting behaviors, and tracking “collision hours,” mission-based dialogues between team members. Both speakers emphasize that building cultural equity requires conscious effort and intentionality, with leaders creating psychologically safe environments where empathy, active listening, and concern for team members flourish. Through personal anecdotes and examples, they demonstrate how cultural assets become an organization’s strength during crisis situations, enabling companies to survive challenges by emerging stronger and more resilient.
Watch the full video here:
