How leaders behave sets the tone.
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Every leader must recognize how a company’s mission and values drive culture and customer satisfaction. Mission and values statements are not something that should just hang on a wall, but instead are the beliefs and way of doing business that starts at the top with the CEO and permeates the entire organization. When leadership, executives, managers and supervisors exhibit behaviors aligned with what you really want the company to stand for, magic happens.
The result is a culture where employees stay, are more engaged and understand what the company stands for. And what happens inside the organization eventually makes its way outside to customers. When employees believe in the company and its values, customers can feel it.
For example, companies like Costco, Chick-fil-A and Trader Joe’s are three examples of brands whose values are so obviously customer-focused that you can feel them in almost every interaction you have with the company.
I recently interviewed Paul Ingram, Kravis Professor of Business at Columbia Business School and author of What Do You Really Stand For?, for Amazing Business Radio, and we talked about how values aligned throughout an organization can directly impact both employees and the customer experience. Here are several of the best takeaways from our conversation, along with my comments:
What You Stand for Shapes Everything
Core values are the main beliefs that guide the company’s actions and decisions. When a company’s core values align with the values of its employees and what its customers care about, everybody wins.
Ingram describes it as alignment. Employees don’t have to think or act exactly alike, but they should share the fundamental values the organization wants to represent.
And that alignment has real value. Ingram shared research he conducted on employee turnover in which he measured employees’ values. He found that employees whose values were aligned with the core of the organization would need an approximately 40% increase in salary before they would switch jobs.
Think about that. Compensation matters, but so does working for an organization that stands for what you stand for.
Authenticity Must Be Authentic
You can’t fake authenticity. Hiring for skill alone could become a problem if the employee doesn’t have a personality or personal values that align with the culture. Disney is known for a hiring process that introduces its culture long before the candidate makes it to the first interview. In one of my Forbes articles, Teri Yanovitch, a former Disney cast member (employee), took us through the process, which included walking into the “casting center,” where potential cast members were introduced to the Disney way. She remembers noticing the doorknobs to the entrance were from Alice in Wonderland. She watched a video before she was interviewed. This pre-interview strategy will either get the candidate excited or give the candidate enough information to know they don’t want to work there.
Ingram emphasized you can’t force values on someone. They must already share those values. Otherwise, you risk inauthenticity. That’s why hiring for values and culture fit can be just as important as hiring for talent and experience.
Employees First
And just as the company’s core values should align with what customers care about, it may be even more important that they align with employees. Ingram said, “If the values of the people who populate the company are misaligned with the corporate values that the company wants to represent to the outside world, it’s not going to work.”
When hiring employees, regardless of talent, if they aren’t a fit for what the company stands for, it becomes a hiring mistake. Everyone working for an organization must be aligned and headed in the same direction. If not, the customer will notice. The result of an internally misaligned organization is employee turnover and customer churn.
I’ve written this many times: What’s happening inside the organization is felt on the outside by customers. That means customer experience starts with employee experience.
Leadership Must Walk the Talk
If leaders don’t act in a way that matches the company’s core values, you can’t expect employees to treat their colleagues and customers any differently.
Ingram pointed out the difference. Leaders can’t simply dictate culture. Culture is created collectively by everyone in the organization. But leaders have what he calls “the most amplified voice.” What they say and do gets noticed. That means leaders can shape and influence culture by setting the right example. Leadership is about showing, not just telling.
Final Words
So, leaders, what do you really stand for?
Before you can expect employees to honor and embrace your company’s values, you need to be clear about your own, which should align with the company’s. Ingram encourages leaders to identify these values and keep them close by. Some executives he has worked with carry a card with their values in their wallet to regularly remind themselves of what matters most to them.
Your company’s values aren’t what’s written on the wall or posted on a website. They are demonstrated by how you hire, how you treat employees and how you make decisions. It begins with how leaders behave.
Get that right, and employees will know what you stand for. And when employees know it and are aligned with it, your customers will feel it.