The Role of Values In Your Organization

It's easy for companies to talk about values. They hang them on a wall, print them in an employee handbook, or talk about them in meetings. When it's convenient, most organizations pivot to values when it comes to giving directions. 

But organizational values alone are not enough.

One of the most cataclysmic alignments as an entrepreneur are foundational values and organizational values. They're completely different, and both are necessary if you want to build a business that not only lasts, but grows.

1. Foundational Values: The Soul of Your Company

Foundational values are the soul of your business. They don't come from a brainstorming session or a leadership retreat. They come from the founder's life experiences, childhood, struggles, victories, and the beliefs they formed long before the company ever existed. 

These values become the DNA of the organization. They influence every major decision, attract certain people into your ecosystem, and naturally repel the people who were never meant to be there. 

Your foundational values give your product, your culture, and your mission something no competitor can copy. It's your only form of true authenticity. Your foundational values set the tone for how you operate your business, and who sticks along for the ride. This is the soul of your company. 

2. Organizational Values: How You Operate

Your organization's values establish the behaviors that allow a team to function collaboratively every single day.

They transform your foundation values into questions like:

• How do I treat my team? And how does that affect their communication?

• How do I handle conflict? How does my team handle conflict? 

• What kind of example do I set as a leader? 

• What does professionalism look like here? Do I live up to my team's expectations? 

• How do we win together?

Organizational values are developed collectively. As more people join the company, they become shared agreements that allow everyone to move in the same direction. As an organization grows, these values become increasingly important because culture no longer happens by accident. It happens by design.

One Without the Other Doesn't Work

Many companies build organizational values without ever identifying their foundational values. They create lists like "Integrity. Excellence. Teamwork."

While those sound great, they're often so generic that they don't actually mean anything. Without a strong foundation, organizational values become rules with no purpose. People may follow them for a while, but they rarely feel connected to them.

On the other hand, having only foundational values isn't enough either. You can have a powerful mission and an inspiring vision, but without clear expectations for how people work together, even the best teams eventually experience confusion and inconsistency.

The healthiest organizations have both. The foundational values answer why we exist. The organizational values answer how we operate. When those two are aligned, something powerful things happen! People don't have to force the culture.

Culture Starts Long Before You Hire

The best leaders know exactly who they are. Their foundational values become a magnet that attracts the right people who believe in the mission. Then, once those people join the team, organizational values create the structure that allows everyone to grow together.

The strongest organizations are the ones where the founder's soul and the team's daily actions are in complete alignment.