Aren’t values supposed to be kinda private? Maybe in a different time, but now, as a family business, you have no greater tools at your disposal than those family values.
Why?
We’re drowning in noise.
You’ve heard of the information age? Welcome to the distraction age. Like the current hurtling turtles in Finding Nemo, it’s almost all we can do to hang on for dear life.
Yet, the paradox of this interconnected world is that we’ve never longed more for a tribe of like-minds and hearts. It helps calm the background noise and help us rise up above the din.
Combine this with a powerful swing of the social pendulum toward individuals coming together to make the world a better place, and you’re at an epoch of world history where:
- Society wants to come together, and
- It’s never been easier for society to come together.
For what will people come together?
People with the courage to stand up and share what they believe in. People with the courage of similar convictions. Shared values – which are inherent in every brand, including yours.
As Roy H. Williams once taught me, “we buy what we buy because our choices reminds—and tell the world around us—who we are.”
Building a strong brand is easy. All you have to do is mirror the values most people don’t even know they have.
What do you stand for?
What do you stand against?
Are you willing to repel two people to gain one for life?
Are you willing to be closed on Sundays like Hobby Lobby or Chick-fil-A? Are you willing to avoid producing electric guitars like Martin & Co.?
Ride the current of your values.
Attune your systems, policies, and procedures, along with your customer experience to those values, and be willing to pay the price for the fact that not everyone is going to like you.
Or would you prefer not to rock the boat and consider everyone your customer? Rather than being something powerful to some smaller section of the population, would you rather try and please everyone?
There’s never been a worse time in history for that strategy.
It will surely sink you.
Identify your values. Hire based on them. Share them with the world. Watch your bale swim along for the ride.
Leave a Reply