organization
Practice Makes
Perfect
BRINGING VALUES TO LIFE IN YOUR ORGANIZATION
By Alan Williams and Dr. Alison Whybrow
Bringing your organizational values to life requires more than simply stating the
values on the boardroom wall. They need to be lived in the fabric of the organi-zation
every day.
This might seem like a tall order, but it is very simple. Bringing values to life
means really connecting people with the meaning of the values in practice. And, through
practice, turning those values into daily habits so that they are lived throughout – from the
board through to the front line and everywhere in between.
The value and benefit of practice is taken for granted for performers at the highest
level in fields such as sports, music and art. Can you imagine teams like the New York
Yankees or Manchester United just turning up on match day? In the arts, would the cast
of Cirque du Soleil just turn up on the day of the performance? Even the Rolling Stones
need practice.
And yet often, in an organizational context, there is an expectation that simply commu-nicating
values is enough with no recognition that values can add so much to the culture
of the business, or indeed how to translate those values into everyday habits. There is al-most
a ridiculous sense of hope and optimism that the values will make things better in
some unspecified way once the leadership team has defined them.
Photo by Stasiek Pytel / Photos.com
HRPATODAY.CA ❚ MARCH/APRIL 2014 ❚ 43