Everyone pretty much has the same rough idea of “values”. They’re Important Things. They’re descriptive of our company today, or they’re statements about who we want to be in the future. Here’s where our understanding tends to waver: values should represent a standard of accountability for every – every – member of the company. If this doesn’t happen – if you act outside of your stated values – you suffer integrity loss. As an example, you’ll start to see this crop up when you retain a “critical” employee even though their behavior is toxic.
Values matter to you as a leader because in the absence of strict policy or a team vote or getting a response from your advisor, they point everyone in the direction of The Right Thing To Do. If you don’t clearly establish them you set the stage for a ton of cultural debt that will cost you far more time, money, and unexpected departures than you ever want to deal with.
Values also matter when it comes to adding new employees. The three main buckets of interview questions I suggest – functional skill, emotional intelligence, values alignment – aren’t complete if you don’t have explicitly documented company values as a standard for comparison.
Accountability. Guidance. Interviewing. These are certainly critical areas with obvious ROI. But there’s something even more important.
Culture.
Values are crucial. But they’re words.
Culture is action. It’s what you actually do, and that’s why it’s even more important than values.
Any difference between what you say and what you do is a failure of integrity. We see that in the headlines all the time (famously, Enron had “integrity” as one of its values). How everyone chooses to act is a reflection on the organization. Everyone impacts culture…leaders disproportionately so.
My actions as a team member are heavily influenced by what I see my boss do regularly. If I see my manager lie to their boss or – ahem – provide “alternative facts”…I will eventually do so as well because clearly that’s OK here.
So you need documented values. You also need to foster an environment of psychological safety so people will speak up when they see company values being violated.