RELEVANCE OF VALUES IN NEW-GEN ORGANIZATIONS
By Balesh Lakshminarayanan
Dictionary says -“Values”: Moral or professional standards of behaviour; principles; The ideals, customs, institutions, etc., of a society toward which the people of the group have an affective regard. These values may be positive, as cleanliness, freedom, or education, or negative, as cruelty, crime, or blasphemy.
“Values” – the word has suddenly become a phenomenon in every organization and board meetings. Interestingly, other similar topics like ethics, integrity, honesty, loyalty etc are now among the top concerns for managers in every organization, across verticals. The relevance of these values and what drives all these companies to aggressively pursue such a trend is a million dollar question and we will try to figure out a comprehensible and sensible answer to this very question in the following passages.
Much has been written and talked, about the importance of values and ethics for the growth of a person, as well as, an organization. Some of the earliest works in this subject, like “ Kautilya’s Arthashastra” dating back to 4th century BC clearly illustrate the importance of ethics & honesty for taking strategic decisions. But, in the present generation, where everyone wants to be at the peak, in the shortest period of time, definitely values are pushed towards the back seat.
In 2004, Booz Allen Hamilton and The Aspen Institute, conducted a global study to understand the importance of values in the companies. One of their most significant findings was that, more and more companies are making their values explicit, a practice that is quite different from what existed 10 years ago. Such studies give us a fresh outlook and possible answers for the intriguing questions we saw earlier.
For once, it’s clear that new generation organizations see “values” as something contemporary and a tool to achieve better brand image, customer satisfaction, productivity and thus the overall objective of growth and success. This trend can be substantiated by the very fact that companies are suddenly showing a renewed interest in building brand image, logos, catch phrases, changing their “vision” & “mission” statements to project their “values” to the outside world and even follow new process methodologies which are in turn nothing but another form of inculcating discipline and values among employees.
Recently, a 100 million$ fine was imposed on Mclaren F1 team, by World Motor Sport Council (WMSC), for spying another teams technologies. Such extreme measures taken by an organization like WMSC displays their professionalism and passion towards values and ethics. This is the exact trend we are talking about new generation organizations. They are fast, bullish and professional, but at the same time they want to project the image that “they care”.
The values followed in different organizations vary depending on the organization’s goals, objectives and even geographical location. A manufacturing company may not have the same values as a software company, and the values followed in India or Japan would be completely different from those followed in America, but the ultimate aim of having values and policies in place is to make the organization more sociable, improve the wellbeing of employees and thus improve productivity. Thus when there is a properly defined value system in place, a single person’s idiosyncrasies will not have an ill effect on whole organization.
Strong values form a strong foundation for an organization as well as future generations. The values shared by people working together soon become synchronous with those projected by the organization, and you start hiring people who share your values. Gradually this vicious circle transforms these very values into inevitable organizational values, which would be later immortalized into pictures, posters and plaques. Over the years these very values would become synonymous with the companies brand, thereby giving the customer, a feel of quality and satisfaction. Well, I guess now you know why Harry Potter chose Ollivanders – “Makers of fine wands since 382 BC” and not from some wanderer .
PS : This is one of my prize winning essays – September 2007 Alcatel-Lucent
