Values are meant to be lived

CultureXP – Blair | 3 min read  

Your company values are more than just words, they are a way of life and are meant to be lived. Now more than ever is this becoming evident just how important this is.

When done well, a defined set of values serves as your guide to continue your Culture's growth and evolution towards your north star. They influence the development of your Culture, business strategies and your brand. To me, no one gets a free values pass. You may have leaders and “rock-star” employees that preach one set of rules and live by another. But there can be no exceptions - nothing but tough love. And the reason I am hot on this is because I see values as a way of attracting the best talent. They play a big part in how we nurture and develop our employees.

Having a recruitment game plan based on outdoing your competitors on remuneration and benefits is lazy. You are short-changing yourself, your company, people, and Culture. As your competitors grow and scale, their ability to match or exceed remuneration and benefits increases. I experienced this first-hand with one of the companies I worked for, however, what separated us was the identity of our company – our values. What we stood for, our way of life, how we measured it and how our people live them daily. This cannot be copied and is your competitive advantage.

Keeping it real, competing for the best talent based on values rather than benefits means that sometimes you will lose out. But by adopting this approach, your company will be the winner because the talented people that do join are driven by more than just the paycheck. Your employees show up to work every day knowing what they do is part of a greater just cause that gives them the passion and permission to do good and be awesome. This flows on to the execution of your business strategy.          

Ask yourself this question - did I see our values being lived this week? It is a question you can ask yourself, your leadership team, and your people. If you did not like the answer or your values, do not reflect the company today, either be the change or make the change. Doing nothing is not a good option.

For many, the culture value design process can be daunting, but I love it. The challenge is to avoid creating lofty-sounding values that read like a marketing campaign or sound, just like your competitors. However, it is deeper than that. Values you learn about on day one of your induction can quickly become meaningless wall hangings if people do not live them. So, what is the secret sauce? We have found the most satisfying results come from involving all your employees, and together we design committable values. By this, we mean values designed by the people for the people and lived daily.

If you splattered coffee all over your monitor at the thought of involving your whole team, relax, we have got this. Like all good things, creating a defined set of values is not an easy overnight fix. But what you put into this, you more than get out. Because this is a great way to consciously create and reinforce your company culture and the delivery of the business strategy. Even better is that you uncover passionate creatives that will amaze you with a range of values that have a purpose, meaning and lived daily by everyone. This is how your Culture should be.        

Thanks for reading my blog. Our world is better when we share, and I would love to hear your insights and stories. You will be surprised how simple culture building is when you have a framework that provides a common-sense process. Reach out for consulting services from the CultureXP team in forming unique and committable values your people will love to live.