10 Core Values of Business that really Matter & Why
We asked the most “prominent” Stanford Graduate School of Business Alumni an open-ended question: “What Core Values are important to you in organization?”
Core Values Topics: open Communication, Consideration, Integrity, Trust, Passion, Value, Direct, Appreciation, making a Difference, “open” Culture.
Core Values of most prominent SGSB Alumni: # = Largest Co’s
Mary Barra/CEO/Gen Motors ($152B) #6 Largest Co in USA
Bill Hewlett & Dave Packard co-founded HP ($111B) #17
Phil Knight got his MBA in 1962 and went on to found Nike, which brought in $24 billion #91
Jeffrey Bewkes, Class of 1977, has been the CEO of Time Warner (($7B) #101
Jeffrey Skoll received his MBA in 1995 and was the founding president of eBay.$20B #180
Kendall Powell got his MBA in 1979 and has served as the CEO of breakfast cereal giant General Mills
Vinod Khosla, Class of 1980, is one of the cofounders, Sun MicroSystems
Stephen Luczo, Class of 1984, became CEO of Seagate
Tech [Hard Disks]
Penny Pritzker is currently serving as the U.S. Secretary of Commerce
Instagram cofounders Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger
Snapchat cofounders Evan Spiegel and Bobby Murphy
and the most famous Alumni – Larry Page & Sergey Brin, co-founders Google ($75B) #40
Below you’ll find a combination of personal maxims and principles that may guide your own organization values.
1. Open & Honest Communication. “Problems fester when teams are not open & honest – especially with diverse teams – where there are a lot of diff-erences of opinion. As a leader, you need to create a culture that rewards & pro-motes honesty – even if you disagree with something. It is also important to be bold – especially if you are a leader and you want to impact your community or change the world. That takes guts & courage.”
2. Consideration: Treating others the way you want to be treated. “I’m a big believer in the golden rule. It is the dominating value in my organizational relationships. If you treat people well, usually they will treat you well. That principle lets you sleep well at night and earns you tremendous respect. Every once in a while, someone will take advantage of you, but you just choose not to work with them any longer.”
3. Integrity. “It means relating to people in a way that is authentic & true. It spans the gamut from not ripping people off, to not putting up a false front. We follow through on our promises to customers & partners, + we do our best to be trans-parent in our relationships. “I have relationships in my organization that go back 25-30 years and most of the agreements we make is on a handshake. With some people that means more than any other contract“.
4. Passion. “I only want people to work with, who feel like it fits into their life’s mission. Life is way too short not to love what you do, why you do it, & who you do it with. You can’t wait for some big event to be your payoff. When you wake up each day, you need to ask yourself: “Is this my best purpose in life? Do I love where I live, who I know, what I do? So often we do things because it is an valued position to take, or because we need to simply pay the bills. You should stay on a Quest to do that while doing something you love, too. Many Stanford alumni will have earned the ability to be selective. You need to ask yourself: “Am I doing what I truly want to do, or just what others expect me to do? I thought, ‘Yes I am! I’m on my path to happiness.’ I believed enough in what I was doing to drown out the doubters all around me.”
5. Trust. “One of our core values is to treat each other like family. When we recruit we look for people who value meaningful relationships. Our organi-zation is all about creating better connections. Our work environment here is very collegial. People have become roommates, good friends, & godmothers. People have a great loyalty to each other. Of course every family is a little dysfunctional, but we try to create trust so people can be open and provide feedback that might be hard. When there is trust, you know it comes from a good place.”
6. Honesty, simplicity + doing something you believe has real Value. “Many organizations do research to try and anticipate the needs of Clients. I say just develop great products or services and tell an honest story about them. “
7. Directness. “With me, what you see is what you get. As an entrepreneur, I like that I get to select my own clients. I choose to work with people who are straight-forward & appreciate my directness.”
8. Appreciation. “We all feel grateful for the way we’ve built our organization together, the opportunities we have, & we work hard to communicate that to our team, our clients, & our partners.”
9. Working to make a “difference” in the World. “It is that most important that organizations take a “socially responsible” perspective to make a difference in the world. I’m a big believer in that on a global level. Organizations are finally asking, what is our ecological footprint? I also believe organizations need to also look at their emotional print on their employees.”
10. Transparency & an “open” Culture. “I believe you should share – what many consider to be secrets – about how the organization is really doing, including the financials, to everyone at the organization. I also believe it is important to encourage creativity. Based on assessment, the best ideas should win.”
Comments: Do you know any other Core Values that would be good for your Organization?
Stanford Univ, Graduate School of Business 7/14 enhanced by Peter/CXO, Wiz4biz
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