Corporate Values Matter | Y Soft Blog

As the company’s anniversary approached, I spent some time reflecting on the many things we have achieved over the 15+ years.

I was recently asked what I would do differently today when starting this business. “Probably everything,” I responded. And it is true. However, one thing that I wouldn’t change, and that I am most proud of is our culture, which is described through corporate values.

 

It’s not that we have them and that they are good (they are). They were created many years ago as a company-wide collaboration, and they are still as valid today as they were then. In fact, at Y Soft, we don’t call them corporate values.

Corporate values are found on a poster somewhere in the cafeteria and forgotten about. Instead, we call them the YSoft Six Attitudes. These attitudes are more like personal characteristics. Strong, effective teams can do much more together and create a great working atmosphere when these attitudes are common and shared among the individuals.

 

For us, these attitudes reflect how we approach people, whether they are employees, customers, partners, or suppliers. We focus on high ethical business standards, fairness, enthusiasm, hard work, and openness. You can read about our Corporate Values here.

 

These fundamental characteristics guide our thinking and decision-making. I still believe that while management may create the vision, strategy, and mission, people create the values or attitudes.

 

Anyone who has interviewed at Y Soft may not realize that our evaluation process includes assessing a comfortable fit with these attitudes. As employees, quarterly performance evaluations contain a section for assessing against each of the six core attitudes in addition to performance. It’s that important to us. Why?

There is a high cost to hiring employees – I’m not talking about salaries, yes there is that – but I mean the amount of time and effort that goes into training them. We invest in people because there is a business need. Having these attitudes up close and personal as part of our performance reviews keeps them an integral part of our business; the attitudes play a large role in defining our culture.

Evaluating performance and culture gives 4 possible outcomes:

• Great performance/great culture
• Poor performance/poor culture
• Poor performance/great culture
• Great performance/poor culture

The first two possible outcomes are easy decisions. The third (poor performance/great culture) has the potential to change performance for the positive with some guidance and willingness. The fourth possible outcome, great performance/poor culture, is the most difficult; every manager likes to have great performers on the team and may be tempted to overlook the poor culture.

We have all probably encountered someone who fits the fourth outcome. The issue here is that poor culture is not an individual concern. It negatively affects those around the person, and for this reason, it is really dangerous.

By including attitudes in the review, the manager cannot overlook the poor culture since reviews are evaluated at the management team level. Nor can the employee since bonuses related to attitudes are part of the overall review. This fourth outcome, then, is really a red flag that cannot be overlooked and has to be addressed—though it is human nature to ignore it.

The relationship between great performance and great culture has some valuable outcomes. I’ve mentioned happy customers, but also employee shareholder value and profits—but I see these as very nice by-products. It is the team result that matters, as there is trust, alignment of purpose, and shared energy.

The next time you talk with any member of the Y Soft team, ask about our corporate values. They’ll make me proud all over again.