How to Use Your Business Values to Make Decisions
Episode 689: Show Notes
It has been really interesting for us to see how centric defining our values has been in ultimately operating our team. We didn’t realize how much we relied on them until some things came to light with our clients. So, what are values to a company? We all understand what our values are in our personal lives, but when we start talking about business values, these things are often assumed. As you grow, you have to be incredibly strategic about identifying your values.
We want to encourage you to identify three values that can help you get focused around how you are going to serve your clients. Asking questions about your boundaries, communication preferences, work style and ethic can lead to clarity around your business values. Having an internal value that is very specific around how your team runs is also critical to your culture. These values make it possible to get everyone on the same page and settle a lot of conversations around what should happen!
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Identify What Each Value Means to You
When you observe how values show up in other businesses, it becomes easier to identify what they mean for you. A great example we have seen is Zappos, which has always been incredibly customer-centric, to the point that team members who aren’t even in customer service are often playing that role. There have been books written about how integral this value is to the way Zappos operates. We’ve found so much benefit in looking around, with the best information coming from larger corporations who are open about their values.
You can’t just have a list of five values and decide that your team is going to live according to them; you have to go deeper. Values mean different things to different people. That’s why we’ve come up with a four step process to figuring out exactly what a business value means to you.
Why is a value important to you? Why have you chosen it? Identify why you’ve chosen that particular word through the lens of your business. Then break down how people on your team can put that value into practice. What behaviors would affirm that your values are truly being embodied in every aspect of your business? Actually map it out!
Next, you’re going to define what it looks like NOT to live in that value. Identify a really specific action or mindset that would be in conflict with that value. Put some curiosity questions in place to do a self-check of whether or not you are actually living in that value.
Communicate, Share & Live Your Values
There’s a trend we’ve noticed with businesses, where team members are technically ticking tasks off of a to-do list, but they’re not being done to the standard the business owners had in mind. CEOs will often blame their staff for the problem, when the real problem is that the values were never communicated on the front end. Your values are the foundation of you setting your culture in place.
That’s why we developed a team playbook that applies to our entire team! Of course, there are things that are specific to different roles, but our playbook covers our big vision corporate values and critical information. We've collected everything that is relevant for every single member of our team, and created a centralized process and place for it. This helps us indoctrinate every member of our team in a positive light.
Take Feedback Into Account
We want to remind you that we encourage healthy conflict within our team. We make it understood that every team member has an opinion they can share, and that we will hear. We don’t run a dictatorship, but we are also not seeking a consensus. Our ultimate decisions are the ones that are in alignment with our values. Our policy is to disagree and commit.
Our time-off policy is a great example of taking employee feedback into consideration, and testing it against our values before making a decision. Our life-first value, and our belief that rest inspires productivity, means that we choose our time-off structure accordingly. When you’re committing to your value, people will generally come around to the idea when they see where it’s coming from.
Foster a Culture of Experimentation
While we aren’t trying out different solutions at the moment, we know that there may be changes in the future. That’s because trying new things is embedded in our culture. We may still experiment with how the team communicates and how we operate. You definitely need to revisit your team’s playbook once a year and see what changes need to be made. But also know that, while this is the guidepost, you can still try new things and experiment throughout the year. You can make changes at any time, based on anything that happens. But when you revisit your playbook, that’s the perfect time to revisit things anyway.
Look beyond time off for your team to consider how project management needs to be tuned up, what the benefits are, and how they are changing, as well as performance reviews, salary changes, and more. Just because you see changes that need to be made, doesn’t mean you have to implement them right away!
We’re so excited for you to dive in and define the things that ultimately set your business up for success. If you’re looking for guidance on how to get started, we offer tips for how to set up your team playbook. Ultimately, you need to do a lot of decision-making. We would love to assist you with writing your team playbook and putting it up in a place where your team can access it (and developing that intranet)!
Quote This
Your values are the foundation of setting your culture in place.
Highlights
Four steps to identifying what a value means to you [0:15:30]
How to take feedback into account and commit to your business value [0:20:58]
How we benefit by fostering a culture of experimentation [0:35:55]
Today’s Guest:
Abagail & Emylee
The Strategy Hour Podcast
We help overwhelmed and creative entrepreneurs break down their Oprah-sized dreams to create a functioning command center to tame the chaos of their business. Basically, we think you’re totally bomb diggity, we’re about to uplevel the shiz out of your business.
Key Topics:
Business values, Culture, Experimentation, Feedback
