Core Values Keep the Right People from Walking Out

You do not want your best people walking out on you.

That is true of any business at any time – but it is especially true in today’s labor market. You don’t want your good people resigning because it might be extremely hard to replace them. If you are in the unfortunate position of losing some of your best employees, it may be worthwhile to take a look at how well you as a company are living out your core values in two key areas: hiring, and providing feedback.

First, hiring.

Qualified candidates are scarce right now for many positions. When you have an opening, you might get panicked or impatient as weeks pass without finding a candidate who has the necessary skills and experience for the job and who aligns with your core values. It is easy to rationalize that “somebody is better than nobody” and hire a candidate with the right resume even though they don’t appear to conform to the company’s core values.

The outcome is usually not a happy one. The person may be hardworking and productive, but if they don’t live out your core values, they are going to butt heads with your best employees – the ones who do great work and demonstrate your core values.

This leads us to the second area: providing feedback.

If you have a new or existing employee who is not living out your company’s core values, you need to give them redirecting feedback. That is, you should clearly identify the unwelcome behavior and its ramifications, and specify what needs to change and how. Many leaders shy away from providing feedback out of fear that it will upset the person and cause them to resign, leaving a hole to be filled. However, if you don’t speak out, you are tacitly condoning the behavior and giving the lie to your core values.

Once again, this isn’t going to upset the employee who doesn’t buy in to your core values … it is going to upset your best employees who really do value your core values. Given enough friction and frustration from fellow workers who don’t live out the business’s core values and who are not being held accountable for that failure, your best employees might decide to take their talents to a company that practices what it preaches.

So, before you hire someone who does not align with your core values … before you decide to tolerate behaviors that don’t match up with your core values … ask yourself: do you really want to risk having good people walk out on you? You know you don’t want that. Stick with your core values, and your best people will stick with you.