Page 48 - The Green Building Bottom Line The Real Cost of Sustainable Building

NARRATING VALUES, SHAPING VALUES, CREATING VALUE 27

5 to 10 percent of staff time. In the middle stages of the process, we probably devoted
a half-day each month or about 3 percent of staff time. Toward the end, we had a flurry
of meetings during which we rolled out a trial version of our core values and belief
statements, and then refined them. This probably took about three days over the course
of a month. All told, we probably devoted about 4 percent of staff time over the course of
a year in developing our core values.

2. Be Inclusive: Try to include as many staff members as possible in the process.
How inclusive a company can be depends in part on the overall size of a company, as well
as the geographical dispersion of staff members. That said, the shaping of values should
be a bottom-up process involving as many individuals at the company as possible.

3. Encourage Storytelling: Not everyone thinks in the broad abstract language of
values. Most, however, are adept at telling stories from personal experience—back-
ground, life-changing moments, the guidance provided by family members and/or
mentors—that speak poignantly about the values we hold dear. Elucidating those sto-
ries is a critical part of the process.

4. Use a Framework: Work from guiding principles to structural concepts to core
values. The systemic framework provided in this chapter can aid the process of shap-
ing values. What should a bill of rights for staff members look like? What would a just
organization look like if we built it from John Rawls’ orientation, creating the com-
pany from a blank slate? These are some of the questions that help frame the shaping
of values.

5. Engage Top Management: Leadership should engage but not dominate. It is
critical to have the active engagement of top management throughout the process. To
do otherwise, to have top management delegate this process, signals its lack of impor-
tance in the grand scheme of things. However, once top management is at the table, it
should not dominate the discussion. To do so undermines the bottom-up essence of the
process and belies the sense that the company’s values are really the values of all staff
members.

6. Don’t Force the Process: There’s a natural tendency to plan the overall course
of this process, including a set deadline by which the process ends. Such planning can,
in fact, be helpful. But the timetable should be a guideline. The process takes time.
Many surprising and unexpected thoughts and feelings are voiced, it takes a while to
learn to hear one another, and people need the opportunity to absorb the ideas being
expressed. Try working at the speed of the slowest assimilators in the room. The point
is to optimize the process, not maximize the efficiency of your time together.

7. Hire an Outside Facilitator: Outside facilitation helps transcend the trap of top
management dominating the process. It also helps ensure that ample time is allotted and
that the process does not come to an abrupt conclusion before it has run its natural