Tag Archive for: values

Happy people at work with high standards and excellent workplace values

Turn Your Workplace Values into Standards

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Transforming workplace values into actionable standards is more important than you think.

According to a 2024 DDI study, 57% of employees quit their jobs because of their boss, and 37% have considered leaving for this reason. These numbers are not isolated incidents. For example, 50% of employees in a 2022 Gallup study said they left their jobs to escape their manager. 

Turnover costs your company between 50 and 200 percent of the employee’s annual salary. To simplify the math, losing ten employees with a $100k average salary means you are throwing away $500k to $2m.

Managers want to do a good job, and people want to work where they feel appreciated and fit in. What accounts for the gaps?

Your values fail to set standards.

It’s a harsh reality that most company values statements are feel-good slogans that fail to shape behavior. 

What happens in the halls and video calls shines so brightly that your employees cannot see what’s written on the walls. You promote what you permit.

Standards, unlike slogans, clearly define what ‘right’ looks like and what’s unacceptable. They shape behavior, empowering you to create a productive, respectful, and supportive work environment that benefits your company and your employees. 

Here’s a simple example using the value of Respect, which a company might define as “We foster a positive work environment because we value our employees.”

There’s nothing wrong with the definition itself, but it provides little clarity on how you want people to behave and why.

Here’s what to do next

Turn the value into a standard using the “X so that Y” formula. 

We foster a positive work environment so that our employees feel valued, speak their minds, treat each other well, and cooperate. A respectful workplace environment encourages people to flag problems, offer fresh ideas, and try new things.

Next, add your standards.

The dance floor can help because it’s a visual that you can co-create with your employees to set clear standards for treating people with respect and defining unacceptable behaviors. Here’s a very simple version:

Finally, provide examples of employees living the values so that people can see themselves meeting the standards.

Susan and Mark had opposing views on building the sales team’s capacity. Susan wanted to boost employee training, while Mark wanted more investment in technology and AI. Instead of bickering, they agreed on a common goal: to improve the sales team’s performance by 20%. Once they created a shared goal, they could examine the best combination of training and technology to boost performance. They co-created options and determined the best way forward, boosting the sales team’s marginal contributions by over 30%.

Standards attract the right-fit prospects and inspire your top talent to stay because people who share the same standards feel like they fit in. 

Imagine what happens when people do not share the same standards. If Susan is an in-your-face “radical candor” enthusiast while Mark prefers agreeable disagreement, one will feel out of place and probably vote with their feet.

If you want your company to soar to new heights, co-create standards for your values and expectations.

Setting standards is part of my latest trademarked program, Building an Inspiring Culture®, which you can take on your own, or we can organize a live-led program for you and your team. 

The program gives you a repeatable, step-by-step process for Building an Inspiring Culture so that you can focus on strategy and growth because your employees meet your standards voluntarily without you having to micromanage. 

You get the practical tools and explicit processes to learn, teach, evaluate, and improve.

Here’s what the program looks like:

  1. Smart Start: Define your Organization’s Common Good
  2. Set Standards: Clarify your Expectations and Values
  3. Gain Buy-in so that people do what’s right voluntarily
  4. Accountability that improves future performance
  5. Build Cognitive Diversity so you make sound decisions and position people for success
  6. Create Psychological Confidence so people flag problems quickly and try new things
  7. How to Address Toxic Behavior so you walk the talk and retain your top talent.

Get the self-directed version here with lifetime access for $997, or hit reply to discuss if a live-led program is a good fit for you and your team.

Core Values

Values: Actions to take to get to your Team’s Core

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A shared set of values will create a strong and productive team. When someone compromises the values, the team struggles to trust and produce ethical results.

As the “Facebook Papers” continue to unfold showing us the fundamental gaps in Facebook’s values one can wonder if they uphold their values or, rather, if their values revolve around making more money and connections regardless of political turmoil or damage to the users. Are the teams functioning at top capacity with the whistleblowing? Is the company reassessing what they stand for?
When leading teams, empathy, integrity, and trust are vital. A shared set of values will create a strong and productive team. When someone compromises the values, the team struggles to trust and produce ethical results.
One of the leadership teams that I belonged to as a junior leader had two senior leaders with large personalities who leaned toward the negative side. I dubbed the meetings the “Tammy and Tim Show” because the meetings were no longer about the agenda, about the organization’s vision or mission, or even about developing solutions to the problems. We wasted hours throughout the years listening to Tammy and Tim grieve about their problems. Do you have a Tammy and/or Tim? Do you struggle to get the meetings back on track? If we had upheld our team’s core values and meeting norms of “start on time/end on time, collaboration, and sticking to the agenda” this wouldn’t have happened and the meetings would have been more productive and less dysfunctional.

Action steps to getting to the core of your values:

Stick to your values. The people in your life will have a better understanding of who you are, what you stand for, and why you do the things you do.
“Our values should be so crystallized in our minds, so infallible, so precious and clear and unassailable, that they don’t feel like a choice—they are simply a definition of who we are in our lives.” ~ Brene Brown.

  • Don’t have “crystallized” values? Get some. Use this simple formula: What + Definition + So That. Identify the value, define it, and the results/outcomes from it. For example: Respect + Treat everyone with dignity + so that each person feels that they can contribute their best and most authentic selves. Then share your values with your employees, friends, and family. This will help hold you accountable.
  • Uphold your organization’s values. If the values are archaic, change them. If you don’t agree with them and can’t change them then you need to ask yourself if the company is a right fit for you.

“Daring leaders who live into their values are never silent about hard things.” ~ Brene Brown.

  • Lean into your values every day to obtain a sense of accomplishment. If you don’t accomplish anything else throughout the day, at least you can say that you upheld your values.
  • Get to know and foster your employee’s values. If family is important to them, honor that. If open communication is one of their values, then communicate with them. This is yet another way to empathize with your employees and create a sense of belonging within your organization.

Additional Offerings:

Are you looking for a Keynote Speaker at your next event? I use my past experiences and knowledge to show you how to be the best version of yourself, surround yourself with the right people, and build highly productive teams.

Book:
Sirens: How to Pee Standing Up – An alarming memoir of combat and coming back him. This book depicts the time of war and its aftermath. It seamlessly bridges the civilian and military divide and offers clarity to moral injury and post-traumatic stress.

Are you asking yourself, “How do I do this?” I can help!
laura.colbert@strategicleadersacademy.com
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Never suffer from vague values again

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I chuckle every time I meet a science-defying person on the sidewalk who hurriedly pulls up their mask when approaching and pushes it down after we pass. 

The probability of catching COVID while passing someone on the sidewalk is equivalent to being killed by a lightning strike. Over a year into the pandemic, this behavior reflects virtue-signaling rather than values. 

Virtue-signalling, like the facades on a Saddam Hussein palace, obscures the realities within. CEO hang-wringing apologia about diversity last year often resulted in no follow-through or change. Harvard business review articles show that most diversity training makes things worse. Still, CEOs throw money at the failed approaches. Plato described the behavior as “seeming over being.” 

You want values that work, and you want what you value to be working. 

Business values are behavioral norms that guide your profitable customer-centric solutions. Some are internal-facing, oriented on how people work together, while others are external-facing to expand your base of loyal customers. The true tests of your values are whether they are profitable for your business, your employees, and your customers. 

If your values set specific behavioral norms that lead to profitable customer-centric solutions, you are going to gain delightful customers and attract employees who will do what’s right, the right way, without you having to micro-manage. Vague values, on the other hand, are slogans that create cynicism. 

The vital step is to set business values that work. To help you do so, I’m hosting the “Never Suffer from Vague Values Again” do-in-ar with leadership expert Jan Rutherford on June 2 at 1:00 pm US Central. 

You’ll come away from the event knowing precisely how to set values that are the right fit for your business.

Here’s the game-plan: 20 minutes of format with Jan; 20 minutes working on your values assignment; 20 minutes of advice and support from Jan and me.

To get the meeting link, please donate to your favorite charity and email me (chris@strategicleadersacademy.com) to me know you’ve done so (I use the honor system, so your word is good enough).

P.S. VALUE-ADDING Leadership(TM) is a master program for leaders and entrepreneurs who want to inspire people to contribute their best and drive the business to new heights. The next program begins in mid-May. More here.

5 Leadership Take-aways From January 6 That You Can Apply Right Now

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It was a horrifying and despicable scene, the violent mob egged on by a sitting President, ransacking our Capitol to disrupt the final act of confirming the 2020 election results.

I used to live 6 blocks from the Capitol and briefed members of both Houses. To see those halls damaged was shocking. The loss of life deeply saddens me. I’m troubled by the state of affairs that led to this incident. 

A democracy is only as strong as the willingness of its people to protect it. Americans will need to rise to the occasion. 

The same divisive and intolerant practices that have characterized both sides of the partisan divide will not yield different results. 

Things can get much worse if we let them.

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What are some practical leadership takeaways? 

1. A leader serves everyone on the team.

There’s a difference between a demagogue and a leader. 

A demagogue is one who gains popularity by whipping-up animosities. 

A leader inspires each person to contribute their best to the team’s success.

You’ve met this standard when your most vulnerable employees feel the safety and confidence to contribute their best and most authentic selves.

2. Character counts. 

You don’t have to be perfect. The only people who’ve never erred are the ones who’ve attempted nothing. 

You build character in the arena of life, making mistakes and learning from them.

The person who repeats and doubles-down on awful behavior is one to get off of your team. 

I’ve seen leaders rationalize toxic behavior. “The jerk gets results.”

The chickens always come home to roost – sometimes with the toxic leader present, other times you realize it after the fact. 

Toxic leaders damage people, teams, and institutions.

3. Values matter. 

Don’t handwave your values with feel-good statements. 

Be clear on your standards and expectations. 

Set the right example. Every employee should know what right looks like, and your actions should be the model.

Let people know that violence, bullying, and name-calling are unacceptable, too. 

No matter how self-righteous a person thinks they are, the physical, mental, or emotional abuse of another human being is wrong and damaging. 

Politically-correct bigotry is still bigotry, and it’s not OK.

4. Build bridges, rather than walls.

Right now, your employees—like many Americans—may be bitterly divided along political lines. 

A diverse team with buy-in to a common purpose, shared objectives, and respectful dialogue has resilience.

Belittling or lecturing people who disagree with you is the fast-track to resentment and paralysis.

If you want to get things done, you need to go to the other person’s bus-stop and see the issue from their point of view.

When you can describe their view back to them and get, “that’s exactly right,” you are ready to find solutions to challenging problems.

Empathy is fundamental to gaining buy-in and getting things done.

5. Keep calm and don’t recycle outrage.

In social and broadcast media, outrageous is contagious. 

Peddling outrage undermines civil discourse. 

Competing animosities escalate and eventually explode. 

What is your #1 leadership lesson?