Traction Tip: Good Culture

Many companies today use their corporate values in their marketing plans to attract new customers. They’re missing it. Your corporate values describe your culture, the way you are inside the four walls, not how you want the rest of the world to view you from the outside. Discovering and using your values to nurture your culture creates a vision for every employee to know “what it’s like us to do.” This, in turn, creates a sense of belonging for all those who share those values, increasing engagement. For the others, it gives them a reason why they should go, or you a reason to let them go.

Values are discovered. You don’t just select them from a list. You evaluate what stands out to you about those you respect and want to be and work with. Those characteristics are your values.

Values need to be clarified. Simply putting “Responsiveness,” for example, on a list isn’t enough. You and all your team need to know what you mean when you say “I want you to be responsive.” Describe it. Tell stories about it. Tell them what it isn’t. Bring clarity so that it’s easy for everyone to know “what it’s like us to do” when it comes to responsiveness.

Values are used to nurture culture. This means you should be using them to filter candidates, recognize and reward your employees, and, if necessary, to identify those who are toxic to your organization and help them move on to another culture that would be a better fit for them.

While implementing EOS®, we use an exercise to discover the Core Values™ of your business. We also provide you tools to validate those values, and evaluate how well someone demonstrates them and fits in your business.

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Entrepreneurial Operating System® and EOS® are registered trademarks of EOS Worldwide (http://www.eosworldwide.com/).