Valuing Values Drives Results

By: Michelle Bogan

A few weeks ago I had the pleasure of hearing Rachel Ligtenberg, VP of retail for REI, speak about REI’s focus on creating an equitable playing field for women outdoors. She spoke with great pride about her company’s commitment to women as an extension of its overall purpose-based business model. REI had record revenue results last year and has spent 20 years on Fortune’s 100 best companies to work for list — neither of these small feats.

Companies using their power and presence for a higher good is becoming more popular with employees and shareholders alike, and the financial performance those companies deliver shows that valuing values drives great results. Customers are increasingly purpose-oriented and socially-minded in their spending, as are employees in where they choose to work, how long they stay, and what they say on social media.

[Related: Five Reasons Reviewing Your Company is the Best Career Move You Can Make]

Google employees made a huge statement when they staged a multi-national walk-out to protest how the company handles sexual harassment — and they got forced arbitration practices to end as a result. On the proactive side, Salesforce’s choice to do an annual pay parity review and recalibration regularly drives huge employee engagement, leading to lower turnover and higher profits.

So why do some companies still value results at any cost? That gets to the heart of institutionalized bad practices where leadership turns a blind eye to moderate to blatant inappropriate behavior — favoritism, discrimination, or worse — and feels justified because the bad player(s) deliver great results.

[Related: The Gender Gap Isn’t About Sex. It’s About Power.]

The problem with this view is that it is taken with blinders on. There is a huge ripple effect in the cost to the company, and it comes out in turnover, lack of advancement for other great people, and inability to recruit/hire outside talent, all of which hold back the company’s top and bottom line performance.

The good news: The word gets out on these cultures, officially or unofficially, and with the power of activist employees, investors, and shareholders, more and more of the bad players are being exposed.

Change is hard, but the fallout from exposure is much more damaging. It all comes back to the commitment of leadership, not just publicly but privately, in the hard day-to-day decisions: the choices they make about who to hire, promote, and partner with, and the standards they set across all those interactions. It comes from personal behavior, as well — from really walking the talk.

[Related: Let’s Celebrate These 7 Wins for Women in 2018]

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Throughout her twenty-five-year career, Michelle Bogan has mentored colleagues and clients, founded and led women’s groups, and helped promote many women and men to leadership positions. In 2018, she founded Equity for Women to advance the mission of empowering women at work.

Originally published at www.ellevatenetwork.com.