The danger of misusing organizational “values”

For most of my career, I’ve been a big believer in defining your values as an organization.  In my previous role, I helped lead an organization of 2,000+ people to redefine an organizational set of values.  I’ve seen the power of values.  And I’ve also misused them.  

And that’s the challenge with values:  they’re easily misused, and sometimes, even outright weaponized. 

At their best, I think values can be a powerful compass – a way leaders and organizations can stay focused on what truly matters most to them, and a way to avoid developing dangerous tunnel vision on their bottom line.  At their best, values help us pay attention to our hearts.  But at their worst, they can become a crutch for the leader’s ego and an avenue for control.  And instead of helping people get in touch with their hearts, values put them in their heads, because the values become the unwritten laws for the “right” and “wrong” things to say or ways to say them.  

I’ll speak for myself.  Early in my career I used values to shape my team’s culture.  A part of me really believed in our values and wanted to make sure we had an environment that felt safe, supportive and affirming for everyone.  But a different part of me wanted to make sure that we were defining the right and wrong ways to behave so that when people weren’t “living our values,” I could more easily hold them accountable.  And that’s where things can get more slippery.  Because if I’m being completely honest, sometimes that meant:  you just hurt my feelings or wounded my ego, so there must be something wrong with what you just did - you must not be living our values.  That’s a tempting place for a leader to go:   “I don’t like what that person is doing … it must not be values-aligned.”

Here’s the basic problem.  The research shows that what the highest functioning teams have in common is not some particular set of values, but the safety to be completely honest with each other.  When people feel like they’re safe to express what they’re actually thinking and feeling, they can share freely and openly without putting their time and energy into figuring out how to frame something, or how to manage their words to avoid landing on the wrong person’s bad side.  They have the psychological safety to speak freely.  On a team like that, when someone says something that might be inconsiderate or hurtful, people on the team let them know that their feelings were hurt.  The culture of honesty IS what keeps people both connected and in check.  It doesn’t fall on the  leader to have a “values” conversation with them afterwards. 

The moment values become the basis for addressing people that are being too “negative” or not expressing themselves the way the leader wants them to – those values may be hindering “psychological safety.”  After all, part of the reason for having a team is to make sure there are people around who can say the things the leader doesn't want to hear (but may need to).  If values are getting in the way of that, they might be doing more harm than good.