Organizational Values, Part I: Creating Them
This is the first in a two-part series on organizational values, which are the core principles and beliefs that shape the culture and behavior within an organization. Values guide the decisions and actions of the people inside the organization and indicate to external stakeholders what is important to the company.
The reasons why an organization should define its values are quite simple and clear: Organizational values are the foundation of a company’s culture. A positive company culture is associated with higher staff performance, retention, and satisfaction. In addition, having clear values helps organizations navigate periods of change.
Some of you may be thinking, “My organization has been around for a long time without values, and we’re fine. Do we really need them?” It’s a fair question, and one I asked myself when I joined 25-year-old uAspire (then ACCESS) back in 2010. I was surprised to find they hadn’t defined their values, but as I got to know the organization, it was clear that the values were there, held up by the highly-tenured staff who built the organization’s strong company culture. I was brought in to grow uAspire and to do it quickly. I recognized that, without defining and instilling the values, we could probably still grow at a rapid pace, but we would be at risk of diluting our culture in the process. So a few months into my time there, we defined our values, and they created a sense of unity and cohesion among team members as we navigated through our aggressive growth plans.
Since then, I have helped a number of organizations define or fine-tune their values. Here are some best practices I have learned along the way.
Identify and engage the “heart and soul” in the process
In any organization, there is one or a few people who represent the “heart and soul” of the organization. They have likely (but not necessarily) been there for a long time, and they are the informal keepers of the organization’s culture. They probably opt into (or are called into) many hiring processes, and they hold a great deal of influence with the team. When you define your organizational values, it is imperative to involve them in the process, ideally in a leadership role and/or as part of an internal workgroup. Not only do they have great instincts on what the values should be, but they can also generate buy-in from team members to the process and final decisions.
Survey the team
If the values represent the entire organization, the entire team should have input on them. Depending on the size of your team, you may choose to do this via a meeting/retreat or a survey. I prefer to use open-ended questions in this initial step. Here are some questions to consider:
What do we stand for?
What behaviors do we value over all else? (Ex: At uAspire, we decided that being Student-Centered was our primary value, above all else.)
How do we treat members of our own organization and community?
How will we conduct our activities to achieve our mission and vision? (Ex: At uAspire, we decided that Excellence was one of our values, and the definition included a commitment to continuous improvement and learning.)
Take all the feedback and utilize your favorite AI tool to identify the key themes that emerge. Before you bring it back to the full team…
Align your values with your strategy
This is an important step that often gets overlooked. Consider your company’s future - where do you expect to be in 3-5 years, and how will you need to behave, internally and externally, to get there? Your values might be a good place to house a shift in standard practice that your strategy necessitates. Let me tell you a brief story that illustrates this point. A few months after I started as uAspire, we were ready to launch our first-ever expansion site outside of Boston. Staff training was to start in a few days, and I asked my programmatic experts where I could find the training decks, talking points, manuals, etc. It turns out we didn’t have them because we hadn’t needed them until that moment. Our Boston program was run by some of the most dedicated and intelligent financial aid experts I have ever worked with, and they had led the training for the previous 8+ years. So I said to them, “Well, you’re coming with me to train the new team, and we’re never doing it this way again.” In that moment - and in many similar moments that followed - the uAspire team realized the need for systems and documentation that would outlast any member of our team and enable us to grow with quality. To recognize this - and to recognize that this behavior was new to us - we created and instilled a “stretch” value that inspired the team to behave in a way that aligned with our future strategy.
Getting to done
Once you have identified and aligned your key concepts with your strategy, I suggest re-engaging the full team to draft definitions. This allows the team to grapple with the concepts and provide you with another round of helpful feedback. The goal of these conversations is a draft definition of each value that is actionable and resonant, not a final product. The difference often involves wordsmithing, which I generally find is best done by a smaller group of people and/or a marketing/communications leader. When you have your final versions, take the time to roll them out, sharing examples of how these values already live and breathe within your organization.
For guidance on how to instill your organization’s values into your operations, click here.
