Have you ever noticed when something keeps coming into your awareness? I’m not talking about the hypnotic yet annoying marketing rendition of California Dreamin’ that is the lottery commercial. I do think the universe is conspiring to market a message to me when I keep seeing something or hearing it or coming into contact with it. I am learning to pay attention. Values is the word that keeps coming up for me. I have been using it an awful lot lately, a search of my writing over the last month pulled it up in no fewer than 16 times, and at the retreat I went to recently both of the speakers I sat in on had as their main subject matter…you guessed it, Values.
I know my personal values. I value family, my work, growth, health, and love, but I’ve been thinking, what about my organization’s values? Although we attempt to live by our personal values, part of being a leader is to articulate the team values to those you lead. I have been contemplating this, and when we had only 5 people on the team it was easy to influence them and work cohesively, especially since 3 of the 5 were my husband, my mom, and me. The challenge has come as we have grown. 20 people was still a tight ship, since I was hands on in the restaurant and James and I personally trained and hired everyone. The ration of 2:20 made it easier to communicate our values to the people working with us.
But now we have over 80 people that work in our organization, some in the front row, the people that greet you and take your order for your food, and just as many or more behind the scenes, prepping, baking, paying the bills, cleaning the restaurant and ensuring that the finished product, the experience we project, is a positive one for the people we serve. With such a large group of personalities it is even more important for us to clarify our values as a company and what we stand for. The shared values of the team are what bring the team together and help to direct the decisions they make every day, and if you have not shared these values with them, there can be less cohesion and chaos as everyone has a different idea of what is important. The team’s values are the glue that hold it together, especially at crunch time.
Most organizations have generic basic core values, like customer service, profitability and integrity, values that no one can argue are important, but the real power for us comes from identifying specific things that we value that if we are living by these things, the rest falls into place. For our organization our core values are:
1. We value people. We believe every person on the team plays an important role in the whole. We believe the best of people and focus being the best version of ourselves for the people we come into contact with.
2. We value teamwork. We know that one of us is never as effective as all of us. In the words of Mother Teresa “You can do what I cannot do. I can do what you cannot do. Together we can do great things.”
3. We value adding value to others. We exist to add value to the people on our team and to our guests. We work together to serve and brighten the day for those we interact with by exceeding expectations and doing whatever it takes to build loyalty.
4. We value personal growth. We believe in everyone’s potential for growth, and that we believe in giving our team the tools to succeed and to grow personally.
Do you know what your values are? Does your team?