Getting Employees Aligned with Your Values * The First Step

The conversation on aligning values and strategy continues. Feryal Hafez sent in this follow-up question to my post on Tuesday (that was itself an answer to a direct question) that deserves more of an answer than I could give in a comment reply.

“Is it possible for a recognition program based on values to function properly, even though employees are not massively aligned with these values? How and for how long and what is the best ways to promote company values so all align with them in the way discussed in this post?”

Feryal adds a post script noting she’s from the Middle East “where talking about this culture is something that needs (enforcement) rather than (convincing to align willingly)!”

Feryal, I’m going to use your own email signature line as the beginning of my answer to you – “It is all about having a positive attitude, everything else will be much easier.”

That is true in the case of aligning company values and strategy as well. You must begin with a positive attitude – an attitude from which you want to stop focusing solely on yourself and your own work so you can see and appreciate the excellent work of those around you. But you can’t stop there. You must go farther to actively thank your colleagues for their efforts.

But even that is not enough. You can’t just say, “Thanks. Great job!” You must link each and every moment of praise and appreciation to a company value that has been demonstrated in an effort to achieve a company objective. What does this look like?

We know that at your place of employment in Dubai one of your company values is “Consistent High Quality.” Let’s assume that a strategic objective for the year is to increase employee productivity by 15%. Perhaps a colleague says to you, “Feryal, excellent work on the employee engagement initiative. You showed Consistent High Quality in researching the best ways to foster and encourage employee engagement here and then in implementing new programs. As a result of your efforts, we’re starting to see improvement in our employee productivity numbers. We know we can count on you to deliver the results we need. Thanks again!”

Now you know what that value of “Consistent High Quality” means in your own work. You better understand that your efforts at researching this topic and implementing a program are noticed and appreciated. You’re now more willing to continue such “high quality” in future projects you may be assigned. Even more, you also understand how your efforts are contributing to your company’s success. You see much more clearly the big picture and how you, in your role, can help achieve the company’s strategic objectives.

But this is still not enough. To get the “culture enforcement” you need, you must now encourage every employee in the organization to do the same – to look around and notice the excellent efforts of their colleagues, to take the time to recognize those efforts, and to link every recognition to a company value or strategic objective.

“Culture enforcement” only comes with understanding of the factors of your culture – your values and objectives. And that understanding best comes through a person’s daily work. Once employees begin to see they will be recognized and appreciated for demonstrating the company values, they will become more aligned with them. The simplest – and most positive – way to achieve that is through a strategic recognition program that makes it fun and easy for a everyone to notice, appreciate and recognize their peers.

Balance * The Key to Behavior and Results

What’s more important to you? That things get done the “right” way or that the desired results are achieved?

I recall how annoyed and even angry I would become as a child when my math teacher would mark my work as incorrect when my answer was right but the I didn’t show all my work or my way of getting the correct answer wasn’t the “proper” method.

I was thinking about this as I read a recent article in Talent Management on performance and the theories of Thomas Gilbert. The author says:

“Doing things right is a waste if you do not achieve desired results. In the workplace, we expend far more energy on behaviors – how people should do things – than on valued accomplishments – the goals to be achieved.”

I argue a need for balance between these two. When the pendulum swings too far towards results, we get ENRON. Too much focus on behaviors can cause us to lose sight of desired results, however. When the two are in balance, the company’s goals are achieved within the proper constraints.

With the insight of an adult, I now understand my teacher marked my math solutions as incorrect because she knew that I arrived at the correct answer more by luck than through sound mathematics. If I continued to use my method, I would more often arrive at the wrong solution.

The same is true in the workplace. While we want our employees to be as productive as possible, we don’t want them striving to achieve impossible productivity numbers by risking their own health and wellbeing. While we would love for a new product to be delivered ahead of schedule, we don’t encourage production methods that also knowingly harm the environment.

That’s the power of strategic recognition programs – bringing balance to behaviors and results. Best practice is to clearly define the desired behaviors and values you know are important to achieving your strategic objectives (and clearly defining those as well). Then encourage everyone, at every level, to notice and appreciate the efforts of colleagues that reflect those values and contribute to those objectives. Keep it in balance.

The Benefits of Culture Aligning with Strategy

Occasionally I receive direct questions through the “Ask Derek” feature at the foot of my blog. While I reply to every question, the best or most insightful questions I answer directly through the blog.

Today I received this question from Christiana Nodjo: What are the benefits an organization will derive when its culture falls in line with its strategy?

While the benefits are numerous (and stay tuned in the coming months for a major announcement on just this topic), I’ll focus on just three:

1) The company’s most important values and strategic objectives are understood by everyone – in the way the CEO intended. Think about it. The CEO has in mind precisely what the company needs to achieve (objectives) and what behaviors/actions will be tolerated and encouraged (values) in getting those results. Too often, however, those objectives and values are lost in translation as the message is distorted as it gets communicated down through the ranks.

As I said in my post on Compensation Café today, “You can no more proclaim a culture into being than you can mandate changes to it, but you can encourage and recognize the behaviors of employees that contribute to the culture you want.”

Recognizing and sincerely appreciating the efforts of employees that demonstrate your company values in achievement of your strategic objectives is simply the most effective way of solidifying your company culture around your strategy.

2) Individually, employees choose to become more engaged with their work. Employee engagement has become the latest industry buzzword, but when in its purest form, the value of engagement cannot be disputed. Always keep in mind that engagement is not something you can foist onto an employee, it is only something you can foster. You can only create an environment in which employees choose to engage – choose to give greater discretionary effort (increased productivity) on precisely those areas you’ve deemed most important (increased performance).

The foremost driver of employee engagement is your company culture. As I said in a similarly titled post on the Enterprise Engagement Alliance blog, the truth of this statement lies in its simplicity. Employees don’t engage with widgets, deadlines or even people, necessarily. People engage with a sense of meaning, of purpose, of an understanding of fair play, of company values aligned with their personal values. The sum of all of this is your company culture.

3) Employees become united together behind these commonly understood goals. Even with shared values and great individual enthusiasm, a team that is not united in its efforts is dysfunctional. Once individuals unite as a team, functioning together to achieve departmental, divisional and company goals, they can reinforce both values and engagement. Mutual dependence develops trust, encourages learning, and fosters the sense of belonging to something greater than oneself.

Management – culture itself – must encourage teamwork by directly rewarding it and by demonstrating its importance. How do you do that? It can be as simple as a director instructing all employees, “Spot all the good behavior you can and recognize it – call it out, because I can’t be everywhere.” In a consistent culture, this is manifest in a thousand person-to-person moments.

How would you have answered this question? What would you have told Christiana?

CEO as Culture Setter * Putting Employees First

In a paean of praise to Bill Greehey, former CEO of Valero Energy and current CEO of NuStar, Dan Hilbert (who worked for Greehey at Valero) describes Greehey’s leadership model that drove Valero to the third-fastest growth rate in American history and increase the value of NuStar from $500 million to $3 billion in three years. The model is simple:

1. Take care of your employees.
2. Demand that employees take care of the community.
3. The community takes care of the company.

How did Greehey take care of his employees? One way was through direct, person-to-person thank-yous for hard work and encouragement for his subordinates to do the same throughout the company. Hilbert also describes the extreme and costly outpouring to take care of employees in the New Orleans area after Hurricane Katrina devastated the area. Greehey also operates under a no-layoff policy.

This is a perfect example of the importance of putting employees (not shareholders) first. If you take care of your employees, they will take care of you, your customers, your community and your shareholders.

The story of a personal thank you is particularly telling -- we all need and indeed crave appreciation and recognition of our efforts. But instilling such a culture of recognition must start at the top -- and be emphatically and consistently demonstrated by the CEO and then encouraged in his direct reports, and so on down the line.

Though I haven’t had a chance to see the American version “Undercover Boss,” I couldn’t agree more with this statement from Professor Michelle L. Buck, director of leadership initiatives at the Kellogg School of Management, when asked her opinion of the show and CEO experiences on them:

“A CEO or top executive won't be able to go undercover or even do a walkaround to meet all employees. But they can institute and create the organizational culture where the top leader has to be the role model. They have to walk the talk, and this has to cascade throughout the organization.”

Whether or not CEOs are actively trying to cascade their desired culture through the organization, they are doing so. Everyone looks to the top to know how they should act. What is being demonstrated or what cultural tone is being set by your CEO?