Everyone has core values posted somewhere.
Integrity. Innovation. Excellence. Customer-first.
Enron had integrity on their list too.
The founder who tells me “our values are respect and accountability” hasn’t told me anything yet. What I want to know is: what does respect look like when the biggest client threatens to leave unless you fire someone? What does accountability mean when a leader misses their number three quarters running?
Values without behaviors are just corporate decoration. And sadly, that is where most organizations operate. They are meaningless. No one knows them, they sit on the website, somewhere, and everyone behaves differently.
But here’s where it gets interesting. Even defining behaviors isn’t enough. Because behaviors need boundaries—the clear lines that say “this far, not further.”
A team that values “customer obsession” needs to know: do we say yes to every request? Do we work weekends? Do we sacrifice other projects? Without boundaries, your best value becomes your biggest liability.
I watched a company nearly destroy itself living their value of “going the extra mile.” No one knew when to stop. Burnout became a badge of honor. The boundary wasn’t weakness—it was wisdom.
The teams that actually live their values? They’ve done the hard work of translating abstract principles into concrete behaviors, then drawing the lines that make those behaviors sustainable.
It’s not sexy work. It requires uncomfortable conversations about what you’ll do and what you won’t.
But that’s precisely why most organizations skip it. And why their values remain just words on a wall.
