Think of any big company or recognisable brand and there’s a good chance they have a set of corporate values.
In an ever-changing world, a set of values can provide a stable foundation from which to grow your brand.
Companies who get it right will make sure these values are rooted in everything they do. Their employees understand their purpose, living their values, meaning their energy is channelled towards achieving a common goal.
But how do you decide what these values should be and ensure employees genuinely believe in them?
We realised if the team were to believe in our values, they needed be involved in writing them. So, armed with a flip chart and a stack of post-its, we took a day out of the studio to reflect on what it meant to work at zed.
We considered the following:
• What is zed good at?
• How do we want clients to feel when they interact with zed?
• What is unique about working at zed?
This self-knowledge was important because knowing how we work and behave now, helped us see the type of company we wanted to be.
Once we had done the groundwork we could develop our values; creating them as a team ensured they were authentic and relevant. They feed into everything we do, from how we answer the phone and sign off emails, to how we work with our clients and each other. They are the bedrock on which our culture is built.
Click
here to see what we came up with…