I know I’m not supposed to say this, but I’ll say it anyway: Company values are lame B.S. Usually.
They are often generic. We respect each other! They usually lack specificity or real meaning. We have fun! And you know that 99.99% of employees aren’t able to recite all, if any, of their employer’s stated values anyway.
Now, sure, some organizations do a better job than others of providing examples and stories to bring values to life. But even then, I remain skeptical about the value of values because so many of them seem like commonsense universal human traits that we learned in kindergarten.
All of which is to say that I’m not sure core values are truly necessary to foster engagement and productivity. They often seem superfluous.
But I know that you may feel otherwise. I know this partly because I always get pushback on my views. And truth be told, my opinions on this topic are hardly solidified.
In her recent piece on TLNT, ERE’s sister site, Sabrina Horn writes about how she made company values meaningful at the organization she founded. Head over to TLNT to read “Do Your Company Values Mean Anything?”