Page 148 - Performance Leadership

Chapter | 9

VALUES AND CULTURE

How would you respond if your friend, who hit a pedestrian with his
car, were to ask you to provide false testimony in court? Such a
situation poses a dilemma, truth versus friendship. Some cultures tend
to honor the law; others favor the friendship. But both types of culture
feel their response proves a core value, integrity.
—Based on F. Trompenaars 1

The Values Dimension
Where the operational and analytical dimensions aim to optimize busi-
ness performance, the social and values dimensions of the performance
leadership framework provide the guidance on how to optimize. Like
people, organizations have values too. In fact, every organization has
values, whether they are written down or not. People’s values and orga-
nizational values relate to each other. Organizational values are an
aggregation of the personal values of key people within the organiza-
tion, and they attract people with the same values to the organization.
The values dimension provides strategic guidance from within, from
what drives the organization to be in business, the raison d’être of the
organization, to how it is recognized in the outside world. See Figure 9.1.
The shortest definition of organizational values is “what is good and
what is bad in this organization.” They are normative and judgmen-
2
tal. Organizational culture is very much related to values; however,
there is a difference. Organizational culture is the practical application
of values in everyone’s daily work; it’s how people make decisions and

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