Inclusion: The BIG Idea

I'm at the Institute for Inclusion's Inclusion: The BIG Idea Conference, in my usual seat at a conference, in the back of the room so that I can take notes on my laptop with as little distraction to others as possible.

Right now I'm listening to a panel of leaders talk about 21st Century Leadership: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, and the conversation going on right now is about values and how important values are to organizational success. A comment from the audience was made about measuring leadership performers on values and how many leaders began to get motivated to promote people values when they were dinged on their bonus eligibility based on not meeting those same requirements. Hal Yoh, chair and CEO of Day & Zimmermann responded:

We don't believe in 'bonus for values'; we believe in 'employment for values.'

What a strong statement about how living company values -- ALL of them -- are simply the table stakes and that you don't get a reward for doing the minimum expected.

More to come...

Comments

[Gavin Heaton]

Maybe I am just cynical, but we have been having this conversation for years. Literally years.

When the rest of your company is structured around quarterly KPIs, ensuring that "values" gain the attention of executives or perhaps more importantly, middle managers (who do the majority of hiring), requires some linkage to performance. Aspiration is great. Would love to know if Hal Yoh has a tangible activation program that runs in parallel to the standard performance stream.

[onepinktee]

Hi Gavin - thanks for bringing this up. Note that he didn't say they don't measure performance on values. The values are the *baseline* and if your performance isn't in line with them, you will get dinged, but you won't be bonused simply for doing what is expected. (They may have something in place for above-and-beyond performance on values, but I don't know.) If I can find out the answer to your question about tangible activation, I will post it and let you know.