Most companies generate a mission statement and/or a list of company values that they gleefully place on their website. These elements are often created by upper level staff and/or a marketing team. Sadly, these lists or statements are periodically trotted out to staff – blatantly telling them what their values should be. Because RTP is shifting to a more ‘personable, yet professional’ outlook, we created a statement of company values that genuinely reflect those of our staff members, both individually and collectively.
So how did we go about doing that?
Kat suggested we try an artistic/creative exercise that she’d done with another team. They had created a vision board of who the team believes they are, and where they’d like to go. Great! I’d been trained in Expressive Art Therapy facilitation and possessed a wealth of art supplies; so I volunteered my resources to pull this off. Although some team members were a bit hesitant, we committed to doing this as a team.
We set aside a day of focus (thank you Jeanne!) – preceded by homework. Each team member was given a series of exercises to help them discover their own values (both personally and professionally). So often, team members can feel more like ‘just’ employees rather than genuine contributors. The point of this project was to steer clear of that kind of thinking, making our team to feel valued, and accountable for the final values outcome. And we were all in…Karin made the trek from Portland to participate live, and in person.
I think it was more work than my team mates anticipated. First we shared with our personal values with the group. We explained how we generated them, and why they were important. Next, we moved on to the company values.
I asked each of my team members for a value suggestion; followed by the requirement that they validate their choice with examples from our work. You see, it’s not enough to just come up with a list of nice words, they have to MEAN something. In performing this project, we came to appreciate the similarities in our personal values, to understand our work mates, and land on a list of values that genuinely reflects who we are as a team: Creativity. Collaboration. Integrity. Perseverance.
Next, came the fun part. Ok, it was a bit of a struggle for some at first; but eventually, we created a decorative canvas, which now hangs in our office. This piece is more than just a list of values; it’s our compass, our map of who we are now and where our team is headed. As we glance over at it, we are reminded of the work it took to create, the cohesiveness of our crew, and our collective values.
Have you engaged with your team about your company values and how they define you as a team and in the work you do? We’d love to hear about it.