Why Values?
An often underused, under appreciated or under estimated element of building an organization/school/team culture is purposefully and collaboratively creating and living the values. I can assess fairly easily which organizations I work with (or not) that have truly invested in their values and model them constantly. It shows in the overall performance of their talent and their organizational energy and agility to change.
By values I mean:
Standards of what is acceptable or unacceptable, important or unimportant, right or wrong, workable or unworkable, in your business, school and in your sport and on your team.
What we highly respect.
What we stand for.
What’s most important to us.
What is expected. What we passionately believe in.
The “non negotiable’s”.
What we are ACCOUNTABLE for.
What we should celebrate most.
Creating an organizations values should be purposeful and collaborative. It should not be rushed. It’s tempting to simply create and publish them (or just use someone else’s - which honestly is a big mistake and ignores your unique situation). The values “walls” may take several coats of paint to get it right and may take some time to dry. That’s a good process and is thoughtful. There is no reason to rush the process. Values are not something that you would expect to change frequently. You want to use them to mobilize, energize and create cohesion.
Often enough, organizations create values at the senior most levels (in business, athletics or schools), post them on the website, walls, tshirts and wristbands, but don’t invest enough in the communication and accountability and recognition aspects. Don’t let that happen to your organization. Values are a symbol of your identity AND need to be more than just an object.
Use values to gain your organizations identity, focus and to achieve greater consistency of behavior. Values are your behavioral guardrails and bumper guards. They are not a math formula. Your organization is not linear, but rather dynamic, complex and fluid. Values are a critical reference point for providing feedback and building/molding “organizational” character and channeling individual character strengths use.
I have a proven, comprehensive process I use with this, driven by diverse experiences and not just a template or model. I can help you assess where you are or not. It’s portable to ANY organization. Reach out right now if you need help. Culture values are key to creating rings of growth in your organization. It’s important to invest the time to get it right.
