How to create a belonging community culture – so everyone in your workplace feels like they belong
Living in accordance with our values isn’t just about talking the talk but actually walking the walk in our daily lives. This entails making sure that our beliefs are in sync with our actions, making it crystal clear what we stand for. To do this, we need to articulate and define our values, translating them into specific behaviours that people can witness and emulate.
Fostering a courageous culture involves linking values with precise behaviours, establishing expectations, and promoting shared terminology within an organisation. This approach helps evaluate cultural compatibility during the recruitment process and guides thoughtful and decisive decision-making.
To effectively put an organisation’s values into practice, it’s essential to take practical measures. Begin by defining your core values, pinpoint the behaviours that exemplify these values, communicate expectations, provide training, acknowledge and reward adherence to these behaviours, gather feedback for improvement, and incorporate values into decision-making processes.
By actively operationalising values and connecting them to observable behaviours, organisations can cultivate a united and effective work environment where everyone is aligned with their shared beliefs.
Welcome to Bundaberg Education and Training modules outline how to implement a belonging community culture in your business or organisation.
Living into our values is a fundamental concept that emphasises the importance of not just professing our values but actively practicing them in our thoughts, words, and behaviours. It involves aligning our beliefs with our actions and making our values a tangible part of our daily lives. Here are some key points and benefits of living into our values:
Alignment of Beliefs and Actions: Living into our values means ensuring that what we say we believe in aligns with how we behave. It’s about being consistent in our actions with our stated values.
Clarity: To live into our values, we must first be able to name and define our values. This clarity helps individuals and organisations understand what they stand for.
Observable Behaviours: It’s not enough to have lofty aspirations or abstract values; we need to translate them into specific, observable behaviours. This makes it clear what is expected and encouraged.
Courageous Culture: Connecting values to specific behaviours fosters a courageous culture where people are encouraged to act in alignment with those values. It sets clear expectations for behaviour within teams and organisations.
Shared Language: Operationalised values provide a shared language within an organisation. This common understanding helps in communication, decision-making, and building a cohesive culture.
Cultural Fit: Defining values in terms of observable behaviours helps during the hiring process. It allows organisations to assess whether potential employees align with their culture.
Productive Decision Making: When values are operationalised, they guide decision-making. It helps individuals and teams make thoughtful and decisive choices that are in line with the organisation’s values.
To put an organisation’s values into practice, it’s essential to take concrete steps. This might involve creating tools, resources, and guidelines that help employees understand and implement these values in their daily work. Here are some steps you can take:
Define Values: Start by clearly defining the core values of your organisation. What principles are most important to you?
Identify Behaviours: Determine specific behaviours that exemplify each value. What does it look like when someone is living into these values?
Communicate Expectations: Share these defined values and behaviours with all employees. Make sure everyone understands what is expected of them.
Training and Development: Provide training and resources to help employees embody these values in their work.
Recognition and Reward: Recognise and reward individuals or teams that consistently demonstrate the desired behaviours aligned with the values.
Feedback and Improvement: Continuously gather feedback and make improvements to the operationalisation of values as needed.
Integrate into Decision-Making: Ensure that values play a role in organisational decision-making processes.
By actively operationalising values and connecting them to observable behaviours, organisations can foster a culture where everyone is on the same page, making decisions that align with their shared beliefs, and ultimately contributing to a more cohesive and effective work environment.