We all know starting a company is not an easy task. It’s not only creating and placing your idea into a specific market, but also going through tons of legal processes, finding the right talent and getting out there to sell the idea.
Although they are a somehow left out something that will help you build your brand from scratch are values. Values must be the core of every company if they want to succeed, because they provide a blueprint for how people in an organization take decisions.
They make every process easier because they dictate the way all employees within the organization must act. They are a set of codes that will guide every action in the company to be aligned to its objectives. Getting that code right early on is critical, so that as a company scales, decisions can be made in an efficient, decentralized manner while remaining consistent with the cultural ideology from its founder and the environment it acts upon.
When creating your set of values, you have to keep in mind that less is more. You could write down 50 values you might look up to but it has to be just those that gets your blood going, the ones that your company couldn´t live without. Those values should reflect your company as a whole, people must be able to identify your company just based on its values. Take AirBnB for example. Their core value is “Be host”, and it is clear what they are selling and what they want to get out there in the world.
This is especially important when you want your employees to enact those values in every task they have. These values need to be memorable and should be connected to the behavior the company has. Here we must remember, values mean nothing without action. Values must lead all company actions well aligned with your objectives, and reflect the core business you want to sell and reshape the world with.
Values must be present throughout the whole organization, from hiring new prospects, to simple tasks like being honest or disruptive when creating a paper or an interview with a potential client.
Of course, values are not carved in stone and they need to be reshaped as the company itself adapts to the present times and difficulties. I don´t recommend changing values often but it is necessary to review their function as the company grows, expands, or seeks new horizons.
Values will help you sell the idea you built the company for and will help your peers and employees act upon them on every task, so when thinking about creating your start-up you have to spend some time really thinking about the core values it will stand upon.
