When starting a business, you think about things like the name, logo, marketing strategy and the list goes on. One thing that gets overlooked, or disregarded as unimportant, are the core values of your business.
After building our core values and really putting in the work — not just putting words on paper that made us feel good, but values that make up our business and what it stands for — the importance of these values is undeniable. After all, core values drive all of your decisions, from new hires to day-to-day operations to, most importantly, how we lead others.
Your core values will need to be able to flow through the business all the way down to the end user. This means leadership needs to set the tone, and staff need to be trained on how to apply core values to specific situations.
When building core values for your business, it should include a long period of discussion. Bring in key leadership to help with this process. Are you a solopreneur? Leverage your personality and network — lean on friends and family to help you.
Having clear values will allow you to grow your business and make sure every decision is a good decision, or at least that you are keeping aligned with what the business sees as important.
Here are the values we use to guide our business and are ultimately what we find important throughout the organization:
Be open-minded and mission focused.
Always positive, always encouraging.
We believe in the Delta Life way.
Love where you are while working toward where you want to be.
Be confident, yet coachable.
When building a business, don’t forget to make establishing core values a part of the process. It will help your business be more successful in the long run.
