Small Word, Big Meaning (How to share values)
You have identified a magic word. It is THE key value, principle, attribute or idea that will guide the strategy, task, or team. For you it has layers of rich meaning, deep thinking, light-bulb situations and nuance. But the person in front of you hears a blank buzzword.
Here are some approaches to get a teflon subject to stick, taking for example “accountability”.
Find the value proposition
Articulate why people want to own that bland or even onerous thing. How does it make the owner look good?
Example: “To me, accountability reveals courage, maturity, self awareness, and the strength of character to make lemonade from other peoples lemons.” This is behavioural modelling, the secret to advertising, film stars and fashion, and FOMO.
Personalise and humanise a cautionary tale (mis-model the virtue)
You can demonstrate there is life after a ‘wrong’ choice, action, or value. Make sure it matches the audience.
Example: “When I was in role x, I got overwhelmed, and focussed on other people’s inadequacies instead of my solutions. Basically, I could have averted a failed project of xyz consequences. It took years for my boss to trust me again. You really miss accountability once you prove yourself unworthy of it.
Model the virtue
If you are talking about accountability, take accountability - Look for an angle to model the behaviour in question.
Example: “I acknowledge this breakdown of clear accountability is on me. When you or anyone is unsure, please cut through my distractions and raise a flag. To make it real, use the red-cards by my door.”
Learn to create a parable
Find a way to distil the message that is a thought-provoking and contagious one-liner, yet difficult to misinterpret. JF Kennedy captured accountability with “Success has many (parents), but failure is an orphan" - a stinging rebuke of those who lack self awareness of their part in a failure, or worse, slink away from it.
An example (not about accountability) of Abraham Lincoln's storytelling is his "Clarity Before Action" approach, conveyed in his statement: "Give me six hours to chop down a tree, and I will spend the first four sharpening the axe." It has not been surpassed as a reminder to clarify goals, have a plan, and equip the team properly.
Turn a word (e.g. a value) into a conversation
…and crowd-source complex meaning. Commonly known as ‘a discussion’, one-way and one-dimensional ideas (like ‘be accountable”) flesh out as different perspectives layer onto it. Any email, article, boardroom whiteboard, meeting or channel can be a discussion if you invite reactions.
Use the ‘3 Act Story’ Template:
This classic storytelling framework works by breaking down the message into three parts: Setup, Tension, and Release. It's adaptable for leaders communicating values, goals, or behavioral changes.
Act 1: Setup/Introduction:
Define the Value or Goal:
Example: “Accountability is about owning your choices.”
Higher impact example: Set the scene with an invitation to picture something good or bad: “Imagine if no-one was accountable for rubbish collection”.
Tip: Wry humour can engage “We really like it when other people are accountable”
Act 2: Tension/Struggle:
Identify the Barrier: Present real challenges that occur when this value isn’t upheld. Use vivid scenarios to make it relatable.
Example: “Project/thing/event x is coming up, and if one piece falls through a gap in ownership, the whole house will collapse”.
Higher impact example: Or use a famous case study - aerospace and health are good places to look. “NASA’s Mariner 1 satellite mission crashed due to a missing hyphen of code. NASA explored accountability to make sure it couldn’t happen again.”
Tip: Questions or hypotheticals instead of statements are high impact, as they are interactive, e.g. “If you were in charge of NASA, would you have explored accountability to make sure it couldn’t happen again?.”
Act 3: Release (Call to Action/Outcome):
Highlight the Path Forward: Offer the solution as a set of behaviours.
Example: From now on, we spot gaps in accountability, make sure I‘m paying attention, check in with each other, watch for stress fractures appearing, and speak up early.”
Tip: End with the ‘zoom-out’ reflection that shows a big picture and a view of ‘happily ever after’ outcome: “Accountability sometimes stings, and that’s a key part of EVERY career - but we use it to grow, not to belittle”.
References and reading:
Heath, C., & Heath, D. (2007). Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die. Random House.
This book explores how simplicity and storytelling make ideas more memorable and impactful, particularly in complex areas like values and culture.
Thaler, R. H., & Sunstein, C. R. (2008). Nudge: Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth, and Happiness. Yale University Press.
Thaler and Sunstein's work discusses how subtle interventions, or “nudges,” can significantly influence people's behavior, supporting the point about incorporating nudges into organizational planning.
Kouzes, J. M., & Posner, B. Z. (2012). The Leadership Challenge: How to Make Extraordinary Things Happen in Organizations. John Wiley & Sons.
This book emphasizes the importance of leaders modeling the values they wish to see, providing a solid foundation for the tip on demonstrating desired behavior.
Gino, F. (2018). Rebel Talent: Why It Pays to Break the Rules at Work and in Life. Dey Street Books.
Gino’s work shows how applying unconventional thinking and actions can foster creativity and innovation, supporting the idea of translating abstract values into concrete behaviors.
Eisenberger, R., & Cameron, J. (1996). Detrimental effects of reward: Reality or myth? American Psychologist, 51(11), 1153–1166.
This article discusses how consistent and intrinsic motivation, rather than just rewards or punishments, can shape long-term behavior, supporting the argument about consistent messaging and nudges.
Tversky, A., & Kahneman, D. (1974). Judgment under Uncertainty: Heuristics and Biases. Science, 185(4157), 1124-1131.
Tversky and Kahneman’s research on cognitive biases can be applied to how employees interpret organizational messages, emphasizing the importance of clear, simple communication to influence behavior effectively.
Why clarity matters: The Bare Bones of Behavioural Mechanics.
Our day is essentially a series of choices. The number of decisions an average worker confronts in a workday vary based on the role, industry, and work environment. Research indicates that:
Quantity: On average, a worker might face 50 to 200 decision points each day.
Complexity: This range includes small decisions (like choosing how to respond to an email) and complex ones (like lots of moving parts, technical subjects and interpersonal strategies and tactics).
Cognitive Load: Studies indicate that the cognitive load from frequent decision-making can lead to decision fatigue, where the quality of decisions declines as the day progresses.
Context: organizational culture, clarity of roles, rules and systems dont shape impulses (e.g. thought crimes). But they add a set of filters that shape the subsequent choice (behaviour) - and over time will shape reflex choices (habits). Add these individual choices together, it then shapes norms. If these are tokenistic, incoherent, full of legacy, or sending mixed messages, what did you expect getting one piece right to achieve?
Clarity: determines whether up to 200 of those decisions are bad decisions
Interested in how this applies to changing workplace mindset, decisions and habits (subconscious decisions)? See the Elevator Briefing.
References and reading:
Schein, E. H. (2010). Organizational Culture and Leadership (4th ed.). This foundational text outlines how organizational culture serves as a shared system of meaning that shapes behavior through norms, values, and role expectations. Over time, culture impacts how employees perceive and react to situations, guiding their decisions and eventually shaping instinctive behaviors.
Bandura, A. (1977). Social Learning Theory. Bandura’s theory emphasizes the role of external environments (such as organizational systems) in shaping behavior through observational learning and reinforcement. As employees are repeatedly exposed to cultural norms and expectations, their behaviors are shaped and become more automatic over time.
Schneider, B., Ehrhart, M. G., & Macey, W. H. (2013). Organizational Climate and Culture. In this paper, the authors discuss how organizational systems (like role clarity and rules) create behavioral expectations. When these structures are reinforced consistently, they guide behavior and eventually influence instinctive reactions to organizational challenges.
Cameron, K. S., & Quinn, R. E. (2011). Diagnosing and Changing Organizational Culture: Based on the Competing Values Framework (3rd ed.). This book discusses how organizational systems (like roles and rules) serve as filters that influence how employees behave and think over time, leading to a shift in both conscious choices and unconscious, instinctual behaviors.
Why Your Values Don’t Make It Off the Poster
It all begins with an idea.
You’re a leader or professional who truly knows the value of values. You’ve soul-searched by committee, articulated what the team stands for, admired its… adequacy, set it free on the intranet, the new-starter pack, and cascaded it via team meetings. Now sit back to watch it powerfully reshape the hundreds of daily work choices made by tens, or thousands, of workers.
Or not. 71% of employees feel their organization's values are just for show.
If it doesn’t, the reasons may lie in various types of tokenism.
Turnkey culture isn’t a thing. You expected too much, too soon, from too little. As critical as it is to know what you stand for, a values statement is not a magic culture in a box. Its a rule set that influences culture.
A values statement isn’t standalone. It’s like a traffic sign in a foreign country: an abstract number on a stick without a mature investment in rules, police, courts, universal driver training, public awareness campaigns on new changes, and years of cause and effect. If you want behavioural changes, maturity level counts. Do you need a new sign—or a holistic do-over?
Your expression is bland. 80% of workers find that company values are jargon rather than real beliefs. Culture by committee, leadership consultancy, and influencer-cut-copy content have hollowed out words like respect. And corporate comms applying verbal lipstick after the fact probably won’t fix low-impact ideas.
The Middle Management Gap. 60% of middle managers report struggling to translate organizational values into daily interactions with their teams, according to a study by the Corporate Executive Board (CEB, 2017). These managers, caught in the execution mindset, often have only token training, and lack the coaching, performance measures and executive tough-love needed.
You didn’t equip anyone else, just told them. Even if leaders are on board, over 60% of staff say they daily witness workmate behaviors that contradict the organization's values. People have diverse EQ and in-built values and an e-learning module or poster won’t shift their dial much.
Your values are a lie, and your leadership is weak—due to condoning an exception, especially in management. Studies show that only 25% of employees believe their leadership truly models the values the organization promotes (Kaptein, 2011). A single incident has a deep and wide impact on trust and engagement, (‘psychological contract breach’), as negativity spreads much faster than success, due to negativity bias and social contagion. And disappointment is very hard to get back in the bottle.
Do:
Inform yourself before you talk to consultants. Explore how different industries in different towns articulate values.
Take a change management approach. Or a transformative one (where the values & culture are living and continually rearticulated). This can be as simple as a plan on a page with a lean fistful of tools and tips.
Invest beyond leaders. Build in-house capability. Shift some front-end spend to the reinforcement.
Journey v destination. Ask about bottom-up culture approaches that give the workers skin in the game. These can be short, sharp processes, and no longer than a top-down approach.
Explore high impact training with immersive simulated scenarios that flesh out real-world nuances for staff.
Build in hard measures/blunt questions on values v behavior in 360 surveys, and deal with hot-spots.
Don’t:
Settle for bland, overused words. 75% of corporate values statements feature "respect." Look at how Nike infers excellence, integrity and respect with "do the right thing." - and asks you to think.
If you like a three word motto, explore refreshingly timeless examples like Microsoft’s ‘smart, kind, helpful’.
References:
Tenbrunsel, A.E., & Messick, D.M. (2004). "Ethical Fading: The Role of Self-Deception in Unethical Behavior." Social Justice Research.
Brown, M.E., & Treviño, L.K. (2006). "Ethical leadership: A review and future directions." The Leadership Quarterly.
Fehr, R., Fulmer, A., Awtrey, E., & Miller, J.A. (2017). "The Gravitational Pull of Negativity: A Framework for Understanding the Contagiousness of Unethical Behavior in Organizations." Organizational Psychology Review.
The Challenges of Middle Managers in Values-Based Leadership
It all begins with an idea.
Studies show that only 30% of employees understand their company's values, and most organizations (70%) struggle to align their culture with values. So, at least you’re not alone. Arguably, the single biggest cause is the glass floor of middle management, where so many big ideas, plans, and values stop dead. You don’t get it: you were once a good middle manager, a leader of people and big-picture thinker. That’s why you got promoted.
Or maybe you got promoted because you ignore all the new corporate kool-aid and just deliver. Regardless, you’re tackling the following problems:
Focus on Delegation: Middle managers are often promoted based on task execution rather than people management. Research shows they tend to prioritize task-oriented goals, viewing core values as elective or even a distraction (Goleman, 1998).
Limited Perspective: Middle managers frequently operate in silos. Caught up in daily operations, they often fail to see the bigger strategic and cultural implications of their decisions. A study in the Academy of Management Review found this operational focus can hinder collaboration across departments, stifling organizational alignment (Wooldridge et al., 2008).
Single-lane Promotion Ladders: Too often, technical proficiency leads to people management roles. Think of every organization you’ve been in— picture a subject expert who was a poor people leader in a high-visibility role, and made senior leaders look weak or incompetent, undermining values across the organization.
Resistance to Change: Middle managers may resist values-based leadership if it threatens their authority or disrupts the status quo. Research published in the Leadership & Organization Development Journal notes that fear of disruption frequently leads to stalling change initiatives at the middle management level (Kotter, 1996).
Bad Performance Metrics: The Journal of Organizational Behavior highlights how performance metrics encourage a “tick box” mentality. When behavioral expectations are poorly framed, values become ‘nice to haves’ rather than integral. Values-based metrics should include hard, practical content, such as 360-degree feedback (Morrison, 2011).
Do:
Lift the gaze through leadership programs and match detail oriented or less people focused personalities with the right coach.
Invest in high emotional intelligence (EI/EQ) development.
Establish a technical career stream that places top experts in advisory and QA roles, without forcing them into leadership.
Learn to assess values-based performance. There are simple, pointed ways to do this.
Don’t:
Tolerate EI avoidance. Exercise tough-love leadership for self-interested silo builders or change-resisters.
Promote people with low willingness or ability to lead others.
References:
Goleman, D. (1998). Working with Emotional Intelligence. Bantam Books.
Wooldridge, B., et al. (2008). "The Middle Management Perspective on Strategy Implementation." Academy of Management Review.
Kotter, J. P. (1996). Leading Change. Harvard Business School Press.
Morrison, E. W. (2011). "Employee Voice Behavior: Integration and Directions for Future Research." Journal of Organizational Behavior.
Strategy, Plan, Action - why a laminated approach delaminates
It all begins with an idea.
TBC