For organizations, values make solutions expensive, time-consuming, lead to falling behind the competition in everyday practice and make life more difficult. For individuals, they interfere with self-interest and pleasure, and reduce excitement. Because values reduce surprises and provide predictability. Living by values matures individuals, reduces the need for control and prevents conflicts. After reading this article, it will become clear why it is difficult to realize values within the corporate structure, but if this is realized, it will be a satisfying and unique experience to work with colleagues who do not “leave their soul at the door”. The 6 stages of “building a values-based organization” are described in this article. It is the duty of managers to prioritize the work on identifying values and reflecting them in life.
What does living with values bring?
Values explain the reasons for our behavior, serve as a compass for our decisions, and build reputation and respectability. The same is true for organizations. Just as we understand a person’s values not by looking at their words but by looking at their behavior, the values of organizations are reflected in the ways they choose to achieve their goals and the ways and methods they use in their relations with each other. Oliver Goldsmith, who lived in the 18th century, said, “You can be a more powerful guide by your life than by your language.”
It is easy to talk about corporate values, but it is not as easy to put them into practice. This requires absolute support and commitment from top management.
Establishing and implementing values within an organization or team reduces conflicts. It prevents negative and destructive behaviors of some team members due to their personality traits and minimizes the direct intervention of the manager. Thus, both harmony within the team is achieved and team members mature. The development of such a working atmosphere requires labor and effort. If this investment cannot be made, perhaps for real but superficial reasons such as “lack of time, too much work”, a significant portion of time each day is spent solving problems arising from relationships and attitudes.
Why is it difficult?
In many organizations, however, values are either undefined, meaninglessly numerous, or there is no correlation between the values that are defined and the daily practices of employees. In this situation, a manager can create values in his or her team that will give both the team and himself or herself a special prestige within the organization.
If the organization has determined its own values, managers have a key role in putting these values into practice. An organization in which these values are reflected in daily practices creates a reputable impression, first on its employees and then on its customers and suppliers.
Value conflicts manifest themselves in setting priorities. Values that are reflected in everyday life in an organization are often represented by behaviors that stem from the values of top management. One of the current examples in this regard can be seen in the advertisements of the “Bosch” company. Robert Bosch, the founder of the company, said, “I would rather lose money than lose people’s trust”. Today, Bosch shares this saying with the public by using it as an advertisement on various media platforms, hangs the posters it has prepared in dealer shops, and makes it visible everywhere within its own organization. Thus, while informing its customers on the one hand, it also “commits” the behavior of its dealers and employees on the other.
Process
“Building a values-based organization” can be realized by going through the following stages.
Stage 1: Identifying the purpose:
Senior Management should take the decision to manage with values and select “value ambassadors”, i.e. people assigned from within the organization. These people should be able to represent the values of the organization through their behavior and take responsibility by actively participating in managing the process. There should be at least one person from HR in this group and they should coordinate the work.
The aim is to make values a part of everyday life, rather than a concept that is hung on the wall but not taken into account; thus ensuring harmony on the basis of both work and relationships and demonstrating their impact on quality of life.
In our studies and trainings, when we ask the participants what are the values of your organization, we usually have a very difficult time getting the answer and very rarely get the right answers. Determining the dominant behavior and relationship patterns in institutions and what they mean is of great importance in terms of managing the process. At this stage, each employee defines his/her individual values, his/her perception of the values of the organization and the values of his/her ideal organization (KDA). For this purpose, it is necessary to measure the behaviors and attitudes that exist in the organization by means of a CVA or a similar tool. Using a tool that makes values, which are an abstract concept, measurable ensures that the picture of the organization is taken correctly and that it can be managed.
Stage 2: Defining and discussing values:
Some of the issues to be considered in the process of selecting and defining values by the project team, which is established within the organization after receiving the results of the BEA and guides the process, are as follows:
Whom do the processes, structures, ways and methods of doing business established within the organization serve? Do these processes and structures support our values? For example, many organizations talk about a customer-oriented approach or customer happiness, but many processes are geared towards protecting the short-term interests of the organization or the comfort of employees, not the customer.
If the organization has identified values, the project group should conduct focus groups using appropriate techniques and identify how employees see the relationship between these values and the way they do business.
Stage 3: Defining behaviors in line with the values identified:
In order for values to move from being abstract concepts to being realized, it is also necessary to determine how these concepts will be reflected in daily functioning. Even when the right values are expressed by employees in organizations, when we examine their reflection in daily life, we observe that the connections are not established. When we question “What is management by values?”, we realize that the answer is not very clear. It becomes important to define how the existence of a value in an organization affects the way employees do their jobs every day.
Today, given that we cannot accomplish anything on our own from start to finish, and that whatever we do, we depend on others, teamwork is inevitable. Therefore, one of the most common values that will emerge during this kind of work is “teamwork”.
Among the many suggested behaviors, the three most frequently selected as “must-haves” in our experience are
- Assume responsibility for any outcome
- Cooperation and solidarity in every situation
- Encouraging and challenging each other for team goals
The systematic execution of these steps ensures that values influence ways of doing business and approaches in the desired way.
Stage 4: Absolute agreement on values and sanctions:
Consensus is essential throughout this entire process. Voting is not an appropriate way as it creates a sense of winners and losers. If there is disagreement on values and behavior, it should be expressed there.
At this stage, the sanctions that people will face if they behave in accordance with the values are also decided. These may include warnings, apologies to team members, condemnation of the negative behavior, and ultimately the removal of the team member from the team. This point is important. Because the purpose of such a study is not to humiliate people, but to encourage them to behave in accordance with team norms through the unspoken and non-sanctioned pressure created by equals.
The most effective sanction for non-compliant behavior is limited emotional isolation, including coldness towards the person.
Stage 5: Realizing and living the values:
Decisions taken in meetings need to be linked to values. For this, it is crucial that managers take ownership and responsibility for the issue. In this case, it is important to pay attention to the passive-aggressive attitudes of some managers. These people may not participate in the discussion or defend their ideas, but may later describe the work as “nonsense” or “empty work”. It should be made clear to them that this will not be allowed.
For example, in a production facility, if “environmental sensitivity” is considered a value, this value should be given priority in solving problems that arise during production. At this point, conflict is inevitable. Because when it is necessary to prioritize customer needs and profitability, if an environmental problem is pushed to the background (which is often the case), it becomes difficult to talk about the importance of this value for the organization.
Values often make life difficult, delay solutions and make them expensive. It is enough to say “but” to justify the violation of a value. “The environment is important, but in some cases customer needs override the environment” means ‘we chose to be environmentally conscious because it is fashionable’.
It is well known that many organizations did not do well in terms of their values during the crisis. Some organizations, which proclaimed that they valued their employees highly, laid them off when the crisis was on the horizon, without seeking alternative solutions. Knowing that these things have been thought about can be useful for managers to improve their value consciousness.
Almost everyone favors “openness and honesty” in all kinds of relationships. However, “gossip” is common in all organizations. In this case, the following can be chosen as one of the behavioral indicators of the values of “openness and honesty”: “We do not talk behind the back of those who are not present.” Those who want to give a broader explanation can add the following. “We do not listen to the speaker and we persuade”. They can even go further and say, “We ostracize those who insist on talking.”
Since gossip undermines trust and teamwork is primarily based on “trust”, this value is particularly important and provides both insight and guidance on how it can be reflected in everyday life and become a part of life.
One of the most effective ways of keeping the values alive and guiding newcomers to the organization or team is to organize a “Values Handbook”.
In addition, it is important to include values in the performance appraisal system in order to put them into practice. While achieving numerical targets is included in the “what” section, the “how” these targets are achieved can also be evaluated with a certain weight. A simple indicator of the consistency between written and official values and actual practices in an organization is who is fired and who is promoted.
Stage 6: Monitoring and keeping the process alive:
In many organizations, once the values have been established “bottom-up” or “top-down”, it is considered “mission accomplished”. To those who ask, “our organization has values!”. The values are framed in annual publications or reports. However, the most difficult issue is to keep the values alive. For this, teams and HR have a big role to play. Regular structured approaches should be used to keep the values alive.
Conclusion
It is the duty of managers to prioritize the work on identifying values and reflecting them in life. But employees are responsible for keeping values alive. Even in fascist societies, the greatest pressure on people comes not from authority but from equals and peers. In business life, the source of this pressure is coworkers. Therefore, “peer-coaching” is an important concept in keeping values alive. However, this requires a strong sense of trust between team members. Since there is no confrontation and sharing of problems in teams where there is no trust, team members will not push each other for improvement in the realization of values.
If middle and senior managers remain silent about values, they will not only remain where they are written, but will also be discredited by senior management. Such a situation is perceived as hypocrisy by employees and provides justification for their own behavior that pushes the rules and boundaries.
The realization of values in an organization, and the resulting wholehearted commitment, occurs when individuals establish a relationship between their work and their reason for being in life. Thus, the individual in search of meaning can move from “working for a living” to working for a meaningful reason. The result is that managers feel less need for control and employees find a sense of meaning.
Values and the Role of HR
HR’s task is to select and implement the right strategy in line with the management’s decision, in a way that allows measurement in this context,
- HR should support the relevant departments in referring to values in all formal and informal presentations within and outside the organization.
- Managing the process we have described in this paper should be the responsibility of the HR authorized by the top management. Therefore, the work on values should first and foremost start within HR. HR should embed values in all kinds of training programs and ensure that the content of technical and vocational skills training is related to values.
- If a major change in values is expected in an organization, a planned effort must be carried out at all levels. For this, it is necessary to make the invisible visible with standard measurements such as the “Corporate Transformation Tool” that measures the reflection of values on behaviors. This is the only way to manage and improve values.
- The member of HR resources who is one of the value ambassadors and responsible for coordination should create a “Values Handbook” for the employees of the organization and present it to the senior management
- Value ambassadors should be created within the organization and these ambassadors should meet regularly.
- HR should include “values” in the orientation program given to new hires and support the establishment of value awareness with different tools.
Prof. Dr. Acar Baltaş
Kaynak: https://kaynakbaltas.com/liderlik/kurumun-degerlerini-davranis-normlarina-donusturmek/
