Your values govern the face your organisation presents to the world when you are not there
Conversaction Newsletter – Week 3 March 2015
In his book, ‘Leading Teams’, J Richard Hackman tells a delightful story about highly engineered customer service. After three aborted take-offs, a flight he was on was finally cancelled. As the aircraft came to a stop a flight attendant broadcast the standard “welcome to this city” message saying “we know you have many airlines to choose from and we appreciate your choosing us.” The city to which they were welcomed was the one they were trying to leave, and their chosen airline had let them down. A comically inappropriate announcement.
This is what happens when teams have their behaviours defined in detail and are not given room and tools to decide on appropriate courses of action. This is a strategic decision in any organisation. In the airline in the story, management had taken a principle decision to define the behaviours of all teams in the business down to minute detail. The manual just lacked the page about how to deal with disembarking after a frustrating afternoon of starts, stops and ultimately a cancellation.
He describes another airline, governed by values. The management team had chosen rather to define a comprehensive set of precepts to govern the whole business. All staff were thoroughly trained in the precepts. A particular cabin crew were therefore easily able to flex between having a fun flight filled with holiday makers and a quiet, no-frills flight filled to capacity with tired businessmen and students anxious to get home.
This is clearly a principle decision. But what is the deal with values? Why are values so important? Here are six advantages from managing against a carefully constructed set of values:
- Values may release creativity. Well-defined and communicated values create a framework within which staff can make imaginative and appropriate decisions in unique circumstances. This is real freedom within the form. And it makes business sense. The organisation is using the talents for which they are paying.
- Values should constrain our tendency to seek harmony, perhaps through doing what we should not. The crew in the value-driven organisation had two very clear constraints. They were to adhere rigorously to airline regulations at all times and they were never to give away free liquor. Resolving service difficulties through giving a complementary bottle of wine was out of the question. Staff faced the customers and dealt with the issues.
- Values should also constrain our tendency to react mindlessly to situations. Insightful values may well have built-in incongruence, requiring thought and dialogue about the best decision for an uncommon situation. This can prevent staff from taking the easy though ineffective way to resolve difficulties.
- Values convey the unique culture of your organisation. Jim Collins also makes this point in his writing about the importance of having values. Wherever your organisation operates, decisions by staff should be based on a common foundation of agreed precepts.
- A solid set of values will also anchor your culture. This is critical if you intend to engage in extensive change. The values provide a rallying point for staff subjected to the storms of transformation.
- Values also provide a framework for recruitment. Acquiring new staff is a thorny issue and organisations regularly put recruits through extensive and expensive batteries of tests. Clearly defined values may provide an initial qualifying filter before you commit assessment resources in recruitment.
You would do well to support staff as they apply your values. There may be specific tools, scripts and training you can offer to make it easy to implement the values. You may also include a policy of open doors to address questions.
Of course the values-based culture is not without risk. Teams may choose to goof-off. If you don’t have sufficient controls to report progress it may take a long time to recognise the damage they are doing. Even worse, a disgruntled team may set out to intentionally damage your brand. And worse still, the team may be engaging in fraudulent activity. Other teams may reinvent the wheel. Inefficiencies may be introduced into the process as teams develop and fine-tune their own way of doing things. They may develop and test an approach that has already been shown to be deficient in other teams.
However these concerns may be more about self-managing teams than values. An attractive topic no doubt. And one for another newsletter.
What are your thoughts about values?
