Leadership and Culture: How Can Company Values Be Implemented in Practice?
Today, many companies prioritise the implementation of leading and cultural values. But what do these company values mean, and how can they be put into practise. In this article, we will face these questions and give a few suggestions and examples on how company values for leadership and culture can be put into practise.
The Meaning of Company Values
The meaning of company values for leadership and culture of a company is often underestimated. Thereby, these moral concepts are very important to achieve the goals of a company.
Company values reflect the basics and values a company decides on. They build the foundation for a company’s vision and strategy. Therefore, they influence the way a company works.
The effect of company values isn’t always obvious, though. In most cases, they are conveyed implicitly, and stay therefore subconscious. But sticking to these values has a clear influence on the behaviour of employees and their way of work.
Sticking to company values leads thereby to more efficient results by individuals and the team too. A shared identity develops across all employees that becomes clearly visible and leads to loyalty. It’s essential for leaders to focus on putting company values in practice and to care about them daily.
Leadership and Culture – How Can Company Values Be Put into Practice?
Many companies define their moral values too general and leave therefore scope for personal interpretation. Some companies try to explain their values in their corporate strategy, but there are significant differences in definition and practise.
Most companies, though, don’t follow any strategy at all, when implementing their values. Moreover, they are just reacting on their daily business. Many values are then only used for decision-making. But that’s not how you use company values. In fact, they should describe a vision for the future.
It’s often challenging to put values into practise at work every day, since they are colliding with daily grinds and business. To solve this problem, companies should implement their values systematical and methodical.
At first, it needs clarification on which values are significant at all, and which priorities should be focussed. Additionally, it is important to develop a strategy for this implementation, and to check and change it regularly.
Together with Your Team
To write down some values because they sound cool and modern to some extent, doesn’t make the chase. Moreover, it’s about analysing already existing values in the company and to get the team on board.
It is easier and more effective to implement values in an existing company, if the team is included for development. Depending on the company’s size, it’s worth to sit down at a table with representants of different departments and talk about values. Another option is to make a survey across all employees, which leads to an overview about the team’s opinion.
What sounds like a lot of work first, pays off in the end. To deal with value based leading in detail, is, especially for leaders, very worth. You are interested in our values and their implementation? Then check out our Instagram. There, we upload daily insights in our company.