Let’s play a game of company values bingo. Circle any of these words you’ve seen a business use before…

Human. Respect. Honest. Drive. Excellence.

I’ve got a full house. 

And that’s led me to share some thinking around company values. Especially why so many don’t resonate with teams, and how businesses can make them better.

Eyes down. 

What are values and why are they important? 

Values should be a set of hardwired principles and beliefs that inform a company’s actions – from the products and services it offers right through to how its people answer the phone. Values have the power to shape culture, attract the right people and make the business more productive. 

Values act as the lynchpin that unite a business and should provide a clear understanding of a company’s essence and defining characteristics. So why then, are we seeing more and more of these bland lists appear? 

Why have values become so generic? 

In my experience, the task of creating values is often assigned to a single person or small team, usually in the marketing or HR departments. 

This mammoth task becomes just another objective for someone to hit, another item on an already overflowing to-do list. Which is dangerous – because the measure becomes doing the work, rather than the quality.

To help manage workloads, outside people (like me) are often brought in to find the elusive answers. 

But if the deadlines are still short, culture is lacking and people are kept at arm’s length from the process, someone from another business is going to have an even harder time understanding and reflecting the attitudes that make a company tick.

Which is why, at the end of the project, companies are often left frustrated, and with a handful of words that could apply to the business – because they apply to most businesses. Find me a business that isn’t people, that doesn’t want them to be respectful, decent and hard working.  

How to create better values 

1. The process needs to be company wide. We can’t expect to set or reflect people’s attitudes if we don’t get their input in the first place. Workshops, focus groups and questionnaires are handy tools to capture thoughts and feelings. 
   
2. We need to acknowledge that changing people’s behaviours is a big task. If we’re asking people to adopt new attitudes, it’s going to take sustained and focussed communication. To learn, people need tangible examples and actions to follow. It takes time and practice to adapt.
   
3. Values need to have authenticity and depth. This can’t be done through a handful of words that are open to interpretation. When I write company values, each one is a headline and a paragraph underneath. This allows me to explain exactly what the value is and why it’s true and important.

Don’t forget values are just a piece of the puzzle

To be truly effective, values shouldn’t be a single piece of internal comms floating around between inboxes and onboarding docs. They should be a part of a brand’s wider strategic work. Here’s an example framework:

Brand Persona > Brand Values > Mission/Vision/Purpose > Culture Documents > Brand Messaging

Each of these key pieces of work feed into each other. They create a ladder of attitudes and behaviours for employees to take on board and model.

A brand persona tells people the character’s shoes they should be putting on. The values tell them how this character thinks and what it believes in. 

The mission/vision/purpose give them goals to work towards. Culture docs tell them what’s expected of them and how to get there. And brand messaging is how all of this is articulated to the wider world. 

The benefits of better values 

Creating authentic values isn’t an overnight task. But for companies that dedicate the time and the resource, the benefits are clear…

• Your team stays. Employees who don’t like their company’s culture are 24% more likely to quit their job. Keeping people happy and motivated is key to keeping them in the business. 

• You attract the best talent. More than ever, people want to work for businesses that reflect their personal values. To get the best people in your team, you need to have values that appeal. 

• You give your people purpose. 70% of employees said that their sense of purpose is defined by their work. Give people purpose and you’ll see better engagement, more loyalty and better productivity across the business.