David DuBois had his “aha” moment in 2003 when realized the company needed to develop core values to drive his culture. So he gathered his management team, compiled a long list of words they thought should be values, then narrowed that to team work, integrity, quality and service with safety being added later. They defined the values and made them an official document.
“We put them in every office and meeting room, at each location,” DuBois says.
L&L caught up with DuBois to learn about rolling out those core values.
L&L: How did you make the values a reality for all employees?
DD: Examples at every meeting – if they have a safety meeting, if they have a tailgate meeting – every time there’s a meeting in this company there is an opportunity for people to share an example of an act in line with our company’s values.
(Something like) “We got behind on a job and I called another branch (to see) if they had any help they could send our way so that we could get this project done because the client had a grand opening and they needed this. They pushed our completion date up by three days. So, they sent us five guys and a truck, and we got it done and we made the client happy.” That’s an example of team work.
L&L: How else did you roll out the values?
DD: We started off by placing them on the back of our business cards. We went a little heavy. We put the definitions on as well on the back of the business cards. We worked it into our marketing and when we’d meet with clients and potential clients, (we’d explain,) “This is how we operate.”
One of the things we do is every manager has their direct reports. We ask (managers) to choose who represents each of these values under their management.
So who stands out for safety? Who stands out for teamwork? Who stands out for integrity? Who stands out for quality and who stands out for service? And it’s really hard because – well they go, “All my guys are good.” And I go, “Well you have to pick one.”
And then they honor them. We use the values as, “This person stands for integrity. He’s been here three years and he’s never missed a day.”
We do it in everything. We have a newsletter and we even list all the examples that come in every month. We take a picture of the person and what happened, whether it was something internal in the company or something a client said.
L&L: What did you learn during the process?
DD: It really takes a year, two years, three years of keeping that alive and not just hanging on the wall, but truly practicing those company values in everything you do. Whether it’s strategy for the company, or whether it’s conflict within the company, or with a client, or a particular project, those are the values you stand by.
Sometimes it’s hard to want to do what you’ve got written there because it’s not easy, or comfortable, but you do. The employees, really, they capture that, and then it really gives the ability for them to make decisions and boundaries, and it really takes a lot more off management later. – Interviewed by Brian Horn
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