Eric Garner, MD of Manage Train Learn
One of the toughest jobs a leader has to perform is to act as guardian of an organisation's values.
An organisation's values are the things that are really important to it.
In the early days of an enterprise, the values are sometimes the only thing that keeps the business going. When other factors make the chances of survival doubtful, such as funds, markets and technology, it is the set of beliefs held by the founders which pull the business through.
The beliefs of the organisation are almost always the beliefs of the original leaders.
These beliefs are intangible. Think of Unilever's belief in cooperation, Mars’ belief in efficiency, IBM's belief in innovation, Hewlett-Packard's belief in ‘plain hard work’, Levi-Strauss's belief in empathy with its customers.
It is the great value placed on these beliefs that ensures these organisations survive their early days and go on to thrive.
Know, live, preserve the values
As the years go by and the organisation changes its technology, products and leaders, there is a danger that it may abandon its founding principles, relegate them in importance or simply forget them. To do so is to risk corporate suicide.
If original values have to change – often a difficult step – then they must be replaced by values just as meaningful, relevant and important as the original ones.
As custodians of the organisation's values, leaders have to know the values, live the values and preserve the values.
Author and leadership expert John Maxwell tells the story of how John Wooden, head basketball coach at the University of California, put values before expediency. Wooden had spotted an outstanding young basketball player whose skills would be an asset to his line-up.
Everyone urged him to sign the youth, but Wooden was unsure. Something in the young man's demeanour bothered him.
So he arranged a home visit, with the contract all prepared in his inside pocket. Taking tea with the family, he couldn't help noticing a disrespectfulness in the youth's attitude towards his mother.
One of the key values in Wooden's team was respect, and it was a value he intended to uphold. As a result, the contract stayed in his pocket.
Values are not just important for the organisation; they are the touchstone that determines whether people succeed in it. When the chips are down, what matters is that people stay true to the organisation’s values.
As Christel Brown says:
"People do things because of their values. People rob banks because their values include greed, more money and maybe recognition.
“People die on the battlefield because their values include love of their country and patriotism."
Values are the ultimate people motivators. In organisations where values matter, people may be dismissed for violating the rules; they should always be dismissed for violating the values.
John Maxwell says that values are at the heart of everything an organisation does, hence the use of the phrase ‘core values’.
"Values are like glue. They hold an organization together,” he says.
“Values are like a ruler. They set the standard for a team's performance.
“Values are like a compass. They give direction and guidance.
Values are like a magnet. They attract like-minded people.
“Values provide identity. They define and identify the team."
Few people today have heard of Phil Knight, Bill Bowerman and Steve Prefontaine. But these three were the driving force and inspiration that created Nike, the sportswear and footwear colossus.
What drove them? A passionate belief that things could be done.
The stories of Bowerman's endless experiments with the family waffle iron, into which he poured rubber to create the best running shoe sole are legendary. So are Prefontaine's battles to make running a professional sport.
Today, Nike actually employs executives as ‘corporate storytellers’ to remind their staff of the values held by the original founders and that their business is about getting things done.
In business, as in life, beliefs can move mountains. Without a positive set of beliefs, and without determination to act on these beliefs, we achieve nothing.
Our beliefs and values drive us and our businesses. As American writer and futurologist Alvin Toffler says:
"Every business has a belief system, and it is at least as important as its accounting system or its authority system."
