Alongside the company’s purpose, values are the most important point of reference. Values promote employee loyalty and motivation. They are an important part of compliance. Integrity can be ensured much more effectively through values than through rules and sanctions.
In my 25 years as a consultant and entrepreneur in various companies, I have seen how a lack of values, values that are not lived out, and differences in values have led to conflicts, employee turnover, and the breakdown of companies.
It is crucial that management and employees identify with the values. This means, on the one hand, ensuring that employees fit into the corporate culture during the recruitment process. On the other hand, it means exemplifying values. And this exemplification applies to everyone in an organization—not just management. Often, the receptionist, the secretary on the phone, or the service representative in the field is the first person with whom external parties come into contact. I myself have often been able to glean a lot of information about a company’s culture from these initial contacts.
The values that are truly lived and the corporate culture are the joint work of everyone in an organization. All employees of a company are immersed in the corporate culture they have created together and are influenced by it. Changing it is a lengthy process, like changing the direction of a supertanker.
Values cannot be taught, only exemplified.
Source: Viktor Frankl – Austrian psychiatrist and author