Values-driven management

If you haven't already noticed, values-driven management (which is not the same as the elsewhere trademarked "Value-Driven Management") is the "new black".  Instead of cute, hollow, mission statements, organisations are now increasingly stating their company values, and every transaction that the company engages in can be assessed for its impact on these values.   Every team, from the senior management team down, is expected to embrace these values.  Goals are formulated that give practical expression to the values, and methods to achieve these are likewise assessed according to how well they advance multiple values, rather than the particular goal under consideration.  Risks the company faces are expressed in terms of threat to the values, or to perceptions of the company's commitment to the values. 

A key process in values-driven management is developing an interpretation of the word that describes the value, in terms that are appropriate to a given context - whether that is a project, team, department,  or collaborative initiative.  Values might be "Accuracy",  "Responsiveness", "Empathy", "Leadership", "Innovation", and so on.  So, as a team member, you will need to reflect what these terms mean for your project, team, or whatever. 

The list of values that a company may potentially identify as important is endless.  And values tend to be interrelated, and not all value-sets

Nurturing Supportive Stable Contributing Responsive Directed Adaptive NZ2100

provide a basis for the company's involvement in the wider community project of sustainable development.  Values need to be chosen carefully, so as to provide a durable foundation for the company's activities over time, as well as being able to be recognised, appreciated, and shared by customers, and other stakeholders.   You will need to think how your values will lead to a commitment to social and environmental responsibility, as well as to efficiency, innovation, and customer service, that are the touchstones for any financially successful enterprise.   Chosen carefully, the values will be easily memorised, invoked frequently, and therefore embedded in the organisation's culture.

As you ponder values that are appropriate for you, we urge you to reflect on the values in the NZ2100 model, and especially the universal nature of those values.

Hypergovernance using the NZ2100 values model

As a CEO, you've decided on values-driven management, and you're looking for a value-set that will work best for you, and will allow you to delegate more, and trust more.  And you want a value set that will be appeal to your business partners and collaborators.  Ideally you want to have the same value set - then your partner may become like an extension of your own organisation.

You want the value-set to establish the tone for the organisation, socially as well as in terms of company productivity and financial performance.  And you also want it to say something about your commitment to the environment.  You also want them to say something about the organisation's culture, and how you expect it to be changing and evolving over time. You want all of this, but you don't want a list of 20 words. You want everyone to be able to remember them, for a start.

By now you'll be starting to see the advantages of the NZ2100 values model.  Just seven words, so easy to commit to memory. Fundamental, and generally applicable, so more likely to be shared by your collaborators.  Relevant, in the focus on responsiveness, directedness, adaptiveness.  Reassuring, in including stability.  Responsible, in emphasising positive contributions to society and the environment, and minimising wastefulness.  And embracing, in that the values apply irrespective of whether you're thinking of the organisation as a social, economic, environmental, or cultural system.  And simple - you can easily set up a 7 x 4 evaluation and reporting matrix to communicate where your company is at in terms of these values.

Finally, the NZ2100 values are measurable.  You can establish "indicators" relevant to each of them, and measure and track these over time.

Now, if others within your network of collaboration adopt these values, then you can share the effort in terms of building management processes around these values.  If you present your reporting graphically using the 7 x 4 matrix, on your website, you can become part of the NZ2100 Network, and be part of the global reporting system.  Maybe you'll be thinking that simply becoming part of the NZ2100 Network is good reason to adopt the NZ2100 values model. You'll be able to claim membership of the Network, a commitment to sustainable development, and you'll be on the way to a systematic response to climate change.

Supply chains

Supply chains bring special headaches in values-management, and claims of sustainability.  How do you know how well your suppliers are observing your values.  Why would they choose the values you've chosen?  Just think, for a moment, how identifying an appropriate supplier could be made a lot easier if adoption of the NZ2100 model was widespread.  For you, demonstrating supply-chain sustainability could be as simple as identifying the volume or dollar value of your inputs that is sourced from NZ2100-certified suppliers.  Otherwise, you've got to look into 1001 different standards and codes, and figure out which ones mean anything for you, which ones are reputable, and which are not worth the paper they are written on.