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By Luis Gallardo
Carrying the weight of your business, profits and employees’ well-being, not to mention your own conscience, can be back-breaking. To ease the burden, activities that aren’t directly tethered to the bottom line tend to fall by the wayside.
But there are subtle factors shaping your financial success beyond hard numbers. If you zero-in on end results alone, you’ll miss these quiet forces that play a major role in advancing or stalling your company’s progress.
The connection between profits, employee productivity and organizational values is undeniable. When your employees understand how every action ties back to a bigger purpose, they’ll take more pride in their everyday tasks, be more productive and exude an authentic outward appearance. Setting high standards for your organization — and living up to them — will encourage others to support your vision, too.
But writing out a few company creeds won’t get you on track to driving real profits. To incite real change — internally and externally — employees and consumers need to get behind your values.
People want to know that their purchase decisions won’t produce negative externalities, so they’ll often investigate brands to make sure something like buying new shoes won’t inadvertently make life worse for someone across the world. They want to use their money ethically whenever possible, and that means supporting businesses that live up to certain moral standards.
Chipotle did a great job of sticking to its values despite the risk of losing business over a carnitas shortage in January. When the company discovered that a major pork supplier had violated its standards, Chipotle pulled carnitas from the menu until it found a solution. No company wants to disappoint customers on a large scale, but Chipotle used the problem as an opportunity to showcase its values, earning respect and loyalty in the long run.
In fact, one report found that employees who know their company values are more engaged than those who don’t. Engaged employees generally have better attitudes and are more productive, which directly affects a company’s bottom line.
Revenue and results are linked to employee performance, which ties back to pride and belonging. This ultimately starts with believing in an organization’s value system. To rally your organization around a set of shared beliefs, start with these four steps:
You may feel like the weight of the world is on your back, but when you have strong company values, they’ll help shoulder the burden and instill a renewed purpose in everything you do.
Image credit: Pixabay
Luis Gallardo is CEO of Thinking Heads Americas, a team specializing in developing and structuring the ideas, values, projects, and contents of the clients it represents. Luis is the former president of brand marketing at Burson-Marsteller for EMEA as well as director of global brand strategy at BAV Consulting. He’s an award-winning author and holds an MBA from IMD in Switzerland and a master’s degree in international relations from the Lancaster University in the U.K.
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