Vision, values and culture

In a profession that sells a promise of performance versus a tangible product or service, a firm’s vision, values, and culture lie at the heart of that promise. Vision is where the firm is headed. Values are the behaviours the firm holds to be important, and culture is the feel, the energy, the society within the organisation. Collectively, they form the core around which the business is built.

The most successful professional services firms treat this interconnected trio as strategic assets and powerful growth drivers. Who you are and what you value and seek to preserve as an organisation affects every aspect of your firm’s performance and growth: how your firm is structured; how it governs and shares profits; how it recruits, trains, and manages people; and, ultimately, how it positions and brands itself in the market.

Personality driven

Each firm that I have belonged to or consulted for has had a distinct look and feel, personality and work ethic - its own signature style and organisational DNA.

And like interwoven strands of DNA, each organisation has been shaped by many factors: internally, by its history, the type of people it hires and how it acculturates them, and externally by how it interacts with clients and the markets it serves. Taken together, all these factors create a unique and potent mix or, as one managing partner described it, ‘that secret sauce that defines the firm’.

Most interestingly, although all organisations have distinct DNA, my own research into different types of professional services firm showed they have amazingly similar core values - even to the point of using the same words on their value statements.

The top values mentioned - integrity, collaboration, client focus, professionalism and respect - speak to a collective passion for, and dedication to, their respective professions, colleagues and clients. Achieving a high degree of professionalism, quality and excellence in their work is the primary motivator for most professionals.

It is easy to say that collaboration and teamwork are important. But it is quite another thing to truly live by and enforce these values. The ability to embed and preserve values over time is one of the distinguishing characteristics of a successful firm. During 100-plus research interviews, colleagues and I found that leading firms share common qualities when it comes to reinforcing their values and expectations:

• They commit the time and resources to identifying core principles and drivers.

In a nutshell, successful firms have clearly defined visions, well-articulated values, and shared ways of behaving that bind their professionals across geographies and disciplines. Such clarity is no accident, but the product of commitment at all levels. Agreeing on vision and values is a highly collaborative, inclusive process; all partners typically weigh in.

Vision and values are periodically reviewed and updated to reflect changes in firm dynamics and to reinvigorate the firm’s commitment to its direction and ethos.

• These firms align strategy with vision and values.

In the top firms, all major decisions around structure, governance, compensation, talent, services and clients are aligned with the firm’s vision and values. Strategic planning - both long-term and annual - is viewed as the execution tool that drives the firm toward its vision and aspirational goals. The close linkage between vision, values and strategic planning ensures that the firm ‘walks the talk’ and remains true to its core principles, however they are defined - even under enormous external pressure.

• They ensure that expansion does not destroy or dilute values and culture.

As firms grow larger and in some cases more globally complex, core values and culture can be put at risk. Organic growth, mergers and acquisitions, new service offerings and surges in staff size can all test a firm’s organisational resilience and affect its behavioural norms and day-to-day operating environment.

The best firms ensure that expansion has a positive rather than negative impact on core drivers. They use teaming, training and mentoring to infuse cultural norms and values, promote consistent client service standards and embed their core principles and behavioural expectations throughout the firm (see case study, below, for an example of the power of teams).

• Ways are found to cultivate and reinforce their culture.

Savvy firms spend impressive amounts of time, money and resources embedding their values and reinforcing their cultures using a variety of channels, tools, policies and procedures. It is a constant, repetitive process to inculcate the values and culture – ‘the water dripping on stone approach’, as one managing partner put it.

The instilling process typically begins with recruiting and is reaffirmed formally and informally through orientation and ongoing training, teaming, meetings and events, and prolific communications. Adherence to values and culture is often publicly rewarded and celebrated, while failure to follow the rules is critiqued and punished.

And yes, some firms do have their values emblazoned on cubes and walls and ‘in 30 to 40 languages on our screensavers’. But for most, such public displays are just the beginning. It is not about showcasing core values and culture – it is about making them work.

• Leading firms monitor and measure adherence to values and cultural drivers.

In successful firms, adherence to values is firmly rooted and rewarded; failure to embrace them can lead to expulsion. Performance criteria clearly establish expectations around values, and professionals are evaluated and compensated based on performance against goals.

Professional services firms: values cited as ‘core’

Integrity/ethics - 74%
Collaboration/teamwork - 72%
Dedication to clients - 45%
Professionalism/excellence - 43%
Respect - 36%
Innovation/creativity - 19%
Social responsibility - 19%
Accountability - 19%
Entrepreneurship - 17%
Diversity - 12%

Source: The Art of Managing Professional Services by Maureen Broderick

Change and fine tuning

Most successful professional services firms continue to embody the spirit of their original founders. However, the world does change, and many firms periodically review and fine-tune their vision, values and culture.

The goal is to ensure that their core principles and operating style continue to reflect both the evolution of their partnerships and changing client needs.

Such renewal initiatives are usually driven by some inflection point within the firm, or a disruption or change in the competitive landscape or in the market. Traditional ways of working may become obsolete, and significant changes to governance, services and culture are required to ensure continued viability. Intense mergers and acquisitions activity over a prolonged period may result in cultural misalignments that require radical adjustment.

Or, as frequently happens, growth surges and the drive to globalise may strain and dilute a firm’s existing culture.

Whatever the trigger, the process that firms undertake to revisit their fundamentals is typically intense, involving the entire firm and an enormous amount of management time.

Collaboration and consensus are important components, and many leaders agree that the process of coming together to establish or reaffirm the vision and values is often as important as the result. It is an opportunity to unite and focus the organisation on a common path.
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Although each firm has its own signature operating style, an initiative to revisit a firm’s core values and path typically includes five major components:

1. Solicit feedback from the partnership and clients

• Formally gather input using a variety of means, including focus groups, opinion surveys, brown-bag sessions and web-based polling;
• Inventory vision and values to uncover aspirational goals; and
• Include client input if appropriate.

2. Envision how you want the firm to be

• Take a blue-sky approach to reimagining the firm’s vision, values and culture;
• Identify tools to support the new culture;
• Identify changes needed in work environment; and
• Create a new values statement.

3. Scope the changes required to achieve the vision

• Mobilise small group to analyse and evaluate feedback;
• Review recommendations; and
• Agree on a slate of specific practical improvements.

4. Map an action strategy

• Map action steps, including both internal and external changes; and
• Create timeline, budget, accountability and metrics.

5. Promote buy-in

• Involve firm leaders in communicating planned changes through a programme of face-to-face meetings;
• Adjust plan as necessary;
• Submit to vote of partnership if required; and
• Using change management techniques, roll-out renewal plan.

Culture change is rooted in changes in behaviour. To encourage the new behaviours you want, be sure that your rewards-and-recognition system reinforces them at all levels.

Reassuring everyone that their contributions count invites them to think of themselves as creative change agents who matter.

Treat change as the key to thriving and heightening performance - and as a journey rather than a destination.

Maureen Broderick is founder and CEO of consulting firm Broderick & Company, and author of The Art of Managing Professional Services, published in November 2010 by Wharton School Publishing