Strong Values Earn Passionate Support

Someone at any level of an organization can deteriorate our relationships with long term clients as well the community around them through behavior that isn’t congruent with their core values. And regardless of their primary focus being on the people involved or the task at hand, those clients and community members will like us less and lose trust if our behaviors aren’t lining up with what we profess as our core values! The inverse holds equally true though.

I once heard Marcus Buckingham explain how differently we approach the companies we like compared to the companies we love. Buckingham said that while we do business with companies we like, we go out of our way to tell the world about a company (or product) we love. And telling the world about a company certainly isn’t exclusive to the ones we love. If anything, being alienated by a company - or even someone representing that company - incites every bit as much word of mouth. Think about it: how often have you taken the time to give anyone a three-star review on Amazon or Google? The one-star reviews nearly always share why the customer was dissatisfied. For the four or five-star reviews to include that same level of detail, there was something about the experience the customer truly loved.

Before we dig into some specific steps for building our values into the experience we provide our clients, as well as communities we serve, or even any measurable ways doing so will benefit our company, let’s consider it from the highest and most general sense. Just like our team members will rally around strong values they’ve seen us model, the same thing happens with the clients and community members who see us stand for things they believe matter. Unfortunately, most folks don’t get to see anything like that very frequently; think back to John Maxwell’s comment I referenced before about just five percent of anyone we interact with working to exceed what’s expected of them. Since I’m convinced his estimate is a bit high, being willing to uphold a core set of company values will undoubtedly go a long way toward ensuring we exceed what our clients and the communities we’re a part of expect from us. When we’re willing to do that routinely, they may find a reason to love us rather than just like us. And that’s where our strong values can build passionate support from those who know us best.

Earning this type of support doesn’t come easy and it won’t happen quickly. In many cases, it may not seem worth it. Moving forward, we’ll work through why it’s worth pushing forward even when it’s tough.