Business Culture

How do you create a strong business culture? What do the first steps look like? The following is a practical guide to establishing a strong company culture rooted in values and purpose.

 

Values

Whether you are choosing your company’s values for the first time or re-evaluating them, here are some good guidelines to keep in mind.

  1. Keep your list of values to no more than five.

    Five values are easier to remember because you can list them off on one hand. There are few things more embarrassing than not being able to remember your values. If you can’t remember them, you’re unlikely to be able to live them out and act on them daily.

  2. Choose values based on ones that you would hire and fire on

    Is there a quality that was missing in employees you had to let go or with whom you’ve had challenges? Is there a quality that lets you know that someone will be a great fit for your business? Considering these qualities helps you to choose what values are important in the people that join your team. You can teach skills but it is much harder to teach values. When you select values you are willing to hire and fire on you are selecting those that are the greatest priority for maintaining the culture you want to build.

  3. Ensure that values selected are ones you will be able to live out both at work and at home

    Is this a value you could live out at home too? If you have to be two different people with two different values, one at work and one at home you will feel conflicted. It often helps to make company values more personal in nature and to keep them in plain language to avoid corporate speak.

  4. Keep the values concise

    Your values should ideally be 1-5 words in length. Remember you can always provide more description when listening them out but they should be easy to remember and state.

  5. Involve your team in selecting your values

    See below for steps in how to involve your team around selecting your values. If you want to create a great company culture, values can’t just be handed down from leadership but rather should be agreed upon by the whole team to ensure buy in.

Step 1

Have your team look over a list of core values and select five that are most meaningful to them. Have them write each value on a sticky note. To see a potential list of core values consider the following. It is totally fine if you want to select a value that is not listed here.

Select the button below for a downloadable version of this list of core values.

Core Values
 

Step 2

Take each of your sticky notes and place them somewhere the whole team can view them (Eg. table surface, wall) If multiple people have the same value put those together next to each other. Discuss as a team why these values are important and how they might also relate to what your business does. If you don’t yet have a team, this can be done on your own however, I also highly encourage you to socialize it by discussing the values with trusted friends, mentors or fellow entrepreneurs and asking them if these seem consistent with you personally and with the type of culture and brand you are trying to create.

Step 3

Discuss as a team if there are any values missing or if the ones listed fully describe your business culture. Ask your team, are these the values we would prioritize when adding new people to our team? Are these the values we are each willing to be held accountable to? Would we let someone go from our team if they weren’t living out these values?

Step 4

As a team have each person vote for their top five values using “dotmocracy” by placing a sticker or a mark of some kind on the sticky note with the value they would like to select.

Step 5

Based on the votes select the top five values and discuss again how people feel about these values being chosen moving forward.

Step 6

Ask each team member to write down the answers to the following questions:

  • What does this value look like when it shows up in my role / my department?

  • What does it look like when this value is missing from my role / my department?

  • What behaviours would demonstrate someone was not living in this value?

Step 7

Discuss as a team how you will communicate these values and embed them in your company’s practices? Where will they be publicly viewable? Which processes will they be added to? Are there any process or procedures that need to change to better align with these values?

Purpose

Why should your business have a purpose? How can it provide you with a competitive advantage? Check out my article below by clicking on the image or link to learn more:

How a meaningful brand purpose gives you a competitive edge

In today's world customers, employees and even investors are looking for more than just profit from the companies they choose, they want to see that they have an aligned set of values. In fact, Larry Fink, CEO of Blackrock the world's largest asset manager stated in his annual address to CEOs " A company cannot achieve long-term profits without embracing purpose and considering the needs of a broad range of stakeholders.”

https://www.atb.com/business/good-advice/start-up-business/how-a-meaningful-brand-purpose-gives-you-a-competitive-edge/

 

Guiding Questions to Discover your Purpose

Included below is an excerpt from Leor Rotchild’s upcoming book, “The Future of Events” which provides some excellent guiding questions to help you determine what your company’s purpose is.

Why does your event [business] exist in the first place and what purpose does it actually serve?

  • Your purpose defines why your event and organization exists, beyond financial gain. 

  • Your vision describes where you want to arrive or a future state. 

  • Your mission is what you will do to arrive, including specific initiatives or tactics.

  • Your values represent how you want to behave in order to get there. 


Finding your purpose begins with a look back. Ask yourself: 

  • Why am I doing this? 

  • What problem did I want to solve? 

  • What passion or motivation drew me to this business?

  • What is our origin story? 

Work with your team and other stakeholders to do a look out and explore:

  • What do we all care deeply about?

  • How can we amplify that to make the world better?

  • What concerns or frustrations do we have about our industry?

  • How can we change what frustrates us most?

  • What are the best practices in our industry?

  • Who are the key influencers? 

  • Can we collaborate or establish partnerships with those influencers?

  • Which particular UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) could we influence if we were wildly successful?

  • Which SDGs could we credibly align with our purpose and values? 

  • How would we measure performance progress in these areas?

  • What partnerships make sense for us to establish in order to address those SDGs?

Finally do a look within and discover:

  • What makes you proud to be working with our organization? 

  • How would you describe our culture?

  • What are we really good at?

  • What makes our product memorable?

  • Where are the areas we can improve? 

  • What are we uniquely positioned to or contribute?

  • What existing programs can we leverage?

  • What might we need to stop doing?

  • How can we incentivize the behavior we want and change that we need?

  • What new opportunities might open up as a result of pursuing a grand ambition?

Determine whether your purpose will help to unlock barriers for people to take action in line with their values:

  1. Make it Big

  2. Make it Easy

  3. Make it Shine

  4. Make it “Yes and…”

  5. Make it Credible

  6. Make it Meaningful

  7. Make it Affordable

  8. Make it Accessible

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