Academy · CHANGE · CORE VALUES IN PRACTICE

The value of core values

for employees & organisations

Abstract words on a wall or a poster in the hallway don't change behaviour. Use core values as a powerful anchor: a clear compass for your organisation and the ultimate touchstone for connection with your people. This is how true value emerges. A strong match between your strategic direction and employees' personal drivers delivers more job satisfaction, ironclad alignment, and better results.

WHAT YOU GAIN

VALUES AS A PAPER TIGER

Values on paper don't drive behaviour.

Better understanding of core values does.

Almost every organisation dusts off its core values during a new strategy, a reorganisation, or a change in leadership. But what sounded progressive yesterday morning often reads like a corporate cliché today. Ask employees what those values actually mean on a difficult Monday morning, and it usually stays quiet.

That is not a lack of goodwill; it's a psychological gap between knowing and doing. Abstract concepts like 'innovative' or 'sustainable' by themselves do not drive behaviour. Behaviour is driven by what people find personally important: their own inner compass.

Especially now, as AI and constant change throw standard routines out the window, employees under pressure quickly fall back on their own core drivers. And if those don't align with the organisation’s values? You get friction.

"If you don't live your corporate values, they aren't values; they're just wallpaper."

Garry Ridge — CEO WD-40

VALUES AS A PAPER TIGER

The daily deadlock on the work floor

When values are not actively lived, two destructive patterns inevitably surface on the work floor:

• The culture clash — You demand both 'innovation' and 'continuity'. This means you ask your people to take risks while at the same time not jeopardising the current work methods. Under pressure, you don't get momentum; you get total gridlock.
• The blind spot — Teams frequently misjudge what their colleagues truly value. Employees adapt their behaviour to an assumed unwritten rule that actually nobody explicitly supports.

Using Shalom Schwartz’s evidence-based values circumplex (validated worldwide across 82 countries), we uncover how values that lie close to each other (such as 'innovation' and 'independence' reinforce each other, while values lying opposite each other (such as 'innovation' and 'continuity' will inherently counteract each other.

These insights serve as the blueprint to transform those abstract words on the wall into true core values that are lived and felt in your organisation. The result: a measurable boost in job satisfaction, engagement, and mutual trust - resulting in a better bottom-line.

From values to value in two interactive half-day sessions

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