Articulating Core Values

For core values to work your team needs to read them and say "that's me". Core values should be clear, detailed, actionable, and something that the whole team feels they were involved in. Here’s how to write good core values while involving your team in the process. 1. Look at What’s Already Working Your values are already showing up in how you hire, communicate, solve problems, and what kind of behavior gets rewarded. Ask your leaders and team: - Who are our top performers? What makes them great? - Who are our best teammates? Why do we love working with them? - What kinds of decisions do we consistently feel are right? - What are we unwilling to do, even if it helps us hit our goals? 2. Choose What to Keep, Amplify, or Change Startups evolve fast. Some early values will no longer fit or you might need to introduce new ones to support where you’re headed. Use this moment to decide: - What values do we want to keep scale as we grow? - What do we need to unlearn or move away from? - What kind of team do we want to become? - What do prospective hires, partners, or investors expect from us? 3. Write Clear, Simple, Actionable Statements Your values should pass three tests: 1. Anyone on the team can understand them, use them, and remember them 2. They guide daily decisions 3. You’d be willing to fire someone who consistently breaks them Write values that sound like how you actually talk. You want these statements to be something you could hear in a meeting. Some examples of core value statements from Proletariat: - “Understand Why” - “Decide Fast and Iterate” - “Take Responsibility” 4. Follow Each Statement With a Detailed Paragraph A core value statement is important because it is easy to remember but it is often not enough. Here is an example from Proletariat’s core values: Decide Fast and Iterate Good decisions are hard, but fast decisions are good. Quickly agree and commit to a well-reasoned direction, even without consensus. The tradeoff is worth it. Act, gather feedback, measure against expectations, and adjust accordingly. It’s okay to be wrong, work to learn from it quickly. Nothing’s sacred and we should always question the status quo. 5. Iterate with the Team Share a draft with your team. Give everyone a chance to read, digest, and comment on how the values make them feel. Ask the following: - Do you identify with these values? - Is there a value or behavior missing? - Are any of these values confusing or ambiguous? You’re not looking for consensus, but you want buy-in and belief. If your team feels the values are fake or forced upon them, they won’t stick. 6. Evaluate Regularly At Proletariat we would review our values once a year but also after any major strategic shift. Send a survey to your leadership team and ask: 1. Do we embody [this core value] as a leadership team? 2. Do we embody [this core value] across the entire team? 3. Should we keep [this core value]?

Culture is everything 🙏🏾 When leaders accept or overlook poor behaviour, they implicitly endorse those actions, potentially eroding the organisation’s values and morale. To build a thriving culture, leaders must actively shape it by refusing to tolerate behaviour that contradicts their values and expectations.
 The best leaders: 
 1. Define and Communicate Core Values: * Articulate Expectations: Clearly define and communicate the organisation’s core values and behavioural expectations. Make these values central to every aspect of the organisation’s operations and culture. * Embed Values in Policies: Integrate these values into your policies, procedures, and performance metrics to ensure they are reflected in daily operations. 
 2. Model the Behaviour You Expect: * Lead by Example: Demonstrate the behaviour you want to see in others. Your actions should reflect the organisation’s values, from how you interact with employees to how you handle challenges. 3. Address Poor Behaviour Promptly: * Act Quickly: Confront and address inappropriate behaviour as soon as it occurs. Delays in addressing issues can lead to a culture of tolerance for misconduct. * Apply Consistent Consequences: Ensure that consequences for poor behaviour are fair, consistent, and aligned with organisational values. This reinforces that there are clear boundaries and expectations.
 4. Foster a Culture of Accountability: * Encourage Self-Regulation: Promote an environment where everyone is encouraged to hold themselves and others accountable for their actions. * Provide Support: Offer resources and support for employees to understand and align with organisational values, helping them navigate challenges and uphold standards.
 5. Seek and Act on Feedback: * Encourage Open Communication: Create channels for employees to provide feedback on behaviour and organisational culture without fear of reprisal. * Respond Constructively: Act on feedback to address and rectify issues. This shows that you value employee input and are committed to maintaining a positive culture.
 6. Celebrate Positive Behaviour: * Recognise and Reward: Acknowledge and reward employees who exemplify the organisation’s values. Celebrating positive behaviour reinforces the desired culture and motivates others to follow suit. * Share Success Stories: Highlight examples of how upholding values has led to positive outcomes, reinforcing the connection between behaviour and organisational success.
 7. Invest in Leadership Development: * Provide Training: Offer training and development opportunities for leaders at all levels to enhance their skills in managing behaviour and fostering a positive culture. 8. Promote Inclusivity and Respect: * Build a Diverse Environment: Create a culture that respects and values diversity. Inclusivity strengthens the organisational fabric and fosters a more collaborative and supportive work environment.

I’ve come to think of core values as having a kind of anatomy. A value isn’t what’s written on the wall. It’s what shows up when there’s pressure, ambiguity, or tradeoffs. In practice, a real core value usually has three parts: A belief: What you actually think is important, especially when it’s inconvenient. A behavior: What people do differently because of that belief.Not aspirational. Observable. A cost: What you’re willing to give up to honor it - speed, certainty, short-term wins. If there’s no behavioral change, it’s not a value. If there’s no cost, it’s just branding. Teams learn values the same way systems do, by watching what’s protected, what’s tolerated, and what’s traded away. That’s the anatomy.Everything else is decoration.

I want to give you a diagnostic. It takes two minutes and it will tell you more about your company culture than any values workshop you've ever done. Here are the questions: 👉 Write down your company values. The ones on your website, or in your employee handbook, or the ones you say in all-hands meetings. Now answer these: 1. If I spent a week in your office, would I be able to guess those values from what I observed, the decisions made, the behaviours tolerated, the things that got celebrated? 2. If I asked three of your employees to describe the culture of your company, would the words they used match your list? 3. In the last month, has anyone been promoted, praised, or rewarded for behaviour that contradicts those values? 4. Has anyone gotten away with something that contradicts those values because they were too valuable to challenge? If the honest answers are no, no, yes and yes, your stated values are aspirational. They describe the company you wish you were. Not the one you actually are. This is not a moral failure. It is an architectural one. Values become real through behaviour, not through articulation. They are defined not by what you say but by what you consistently reward, what you tolerate under pressure, and what you hold the line on when it costs you something. 👉 Here is what actual values work looks like: 1. Start with the CEO, the person. What standard do you hold even when nobody is watching and it costs you something? Your company values will emerge from who you actually are, whether you have examined that or not. So start there, honestly, that's where your real values live. 2. Audit the gap: For each stated value, find three recent examples where it was genuinely demonstrated and one where it was quietly compromised. The compromises tell you more than the examples. 3. Define the behaviours: For each value, write two or three specific observable behaviours that would tell a new employee "this value is real here." If you can't write them, the value is not operational. 4. Build the accountability mechanism: What happens when a value is violated? By anyone, at any level? Without this, values are wishes. Real values are not about aspiration. They are about architecture. What would your Coherence Audit reveal? #PeopleStrategy #FounderTips #IdentityFirst #FromZeroTo1000

𝗥𝗲𝗮𝗱𝘆 𝘁𝗼 𝗧𝗲𝘀𝘁 𝗬𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝗩𝗮𝗹𝘂𝗲𝘀? Values that can’t be tested aren’t values at all. They’re preferences. Write down your 4 or 5 core values and give each one an 𝘢𝘤𝘵𝘪𝘷𝘦 𝘭𝘢𝘣𝘦𝘭. Not a single word, but a phrase that implies behavior. For example: “𝘛𝘦𝘭𝘭 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘵𝘳𝘶𝘵𝘩, 𝘦𝘷𝘦𝘯 𝘸𝘩𝘦𝘯 𝘪𝘵’𝘴 𝘶𝘯𝘤𝘰𝘮𝘧𝘰𝘳𝘵𝘢𝘣𝘭𝘦.” Then pressure-test each value with four questions: 𝟭. 𝗖𝗮𝗻 𝗜 𝘂𝘀𝗲 𝗶𝘁 𝘁𝗼 𝗱𝗲𝗰𝗶𝗱𝗲? Think about a real leadership moment; one filled with risk or ambiguity. Would this value have pointed to a clear path forward? Strong values don’t make decisions easy, but they 𝘥𝘰 make them clearer. 𝟮. 𝗗𝗼𝗲𝘀 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗼𝗽𝗽𝗼𝘀𝗶𝘁𝗲 𝘀𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴? Flip the value on its head. If the inverse triggers a visceral reaction, you’ve likely uncovered something non-negotiable. Indifference is a signal. Discomfort is information. 𝟯. 𝗜𝘀 𝗶𝘁 𝗺𝗼𝗿𝗲 𝘁𝗵𝗮𝗻 𝗼𝗻𝗲 𝘄𝗼𝗿𝗱? Words like 𝘵𝘳𝘶𝘴𝘵 or 𝘦𝘹𝘤𝘦𝘭𝘭𝘦𝘯𝘤𝘦 are too abstract to guide behavior. Real values act as guardrails. If you can’t picture what it looks like to live them out on an ordinary afternoon, they won’t hold up under pressure. 𝟰. 𝗖𝗮𝗻 𝗜 𝗺𝗲𝗮𝘀𝘂𝗿𝗲 𝗺𝘆𝘀𝗲𝗹𝗳 𝗮𝗴𝗮𝗶𝗻𝘀𝘁 𝗶𝘁? Great values invite accountability. Can you objectively evaluate your behavior? Did you communicate transparently? Did your actions match your words? If you can answer 𝘺𝘦𝘴 to all four, you’re not just naming values, you’re defining standards. Values like these keep leaders from defaulting to shortcuts when pressure mounts. Over time, they become a quiet but reliable compass. Especially when the right answer isn’t obvious. And in leadership, it rarely is.

I’ve written here before about generic corporate values like Integrity, Respect, and Excellence. They state positive virtues, not distinct values. And because nobody would ever argue with them, they don’t drive decision-making or culture. They don’t, as Jim Collins might say, “have teeth.”   In the current issue of Harvard Business Review, INSEAD's Erin Meyer proposes a test for crafting better values: consider dilemmas.   Here is her example: Say you’re managing a small team of marketers. You know there’s a 60 percent chance that the team will be reshuffled in four months due to a reorg. Do you tell them now or do you wait until you know whether it’s going to happen?   Meyer says that when she presents this scenario to managers, just under half say they would share the information, while just over half say they would wait. Both are reasonable decisions.   But if the manager belongs to an organization with sharp values and a unique culture, the answer could be a lot clearer, and much likelier to reinforce the ethos the CEO and leadership team has built. If one of the values is Radical Transparency, for example, that’s your answer for you. You tell them about the possible reorg. If, on the other hand, you’ve established Relentless Focus as a value, you probably don’t want to share something that, while still only a possibility, is likely to distract the marketers from their current goals.   Deliberately thinking through such dilemmas—and sharing the most instructive ones with your team—is an excellent way to bring your company’s core values to life. Remember that a dilemma is most enlightening when either side is supportable.

Beliefs drive behavior, and behaviors drive results. This is precisely why 72% of organizations use core values. However, too many leaders and teams settle for one-word values like "integrity" or "excellence" and hope they shape behavior. The problem? One word isn't enough. It's vague, open to interpretation, and easy to ignore. I will take it a step further, one word, core values are lazy. The best leaders do something different. They define culture behaviors: short, memorable phrases that make the values real: - Prepare two steps ahead - Treat each other well - Next-level hustle When you define, communicate, and protect culture behaviors, you give your team clarity and accountability. Without them, values stay empty. What do you think works better: One-word core values or culture behaviors? #leadership #culture #coaching LinkedIn News

Core values in construction use all the same 5 words: Integrity. Respect. Safety. Excellence. Accountability. And when your core values sound like that. ^ People forget them, don't care about them, and throw the little core values cut-out in their drawers. And never go looking for them ever again. Your goal as a leader is to make your core values simple, practical, and applicable. Capturing both who you are now and who you're becoming. So instead of "Integrity" try -> "Stay true, even when it’s hard." That's far more impactful, and I can picture living that out. Here's another one: Instead of "Excellence" try -> "Set the standard, then break it." People who align with that mentality will automatically know they're home. Core values are usually a huge miss in construction. But they don't have to be. If you take them seriously, so will your people.