How to Operationalize Your Core Values
- Steve Wilcox
- a few seconds ago
- 5 min read
Author, Steve Wilcox, is a Senior Business Advisor with The Resultants.
I once walked into the office of a potential client and saw a beautiful wall display of five core values behind the receptionist's desk.
As I waited for my appointment, I mentioned to the receptionist how great the values were. What an amazing guide for employees and customers!
Her response?
"Oh those? We don't really use them. Our boss saw them on the wall of another company and thought they were cool, so he had me put them on our wall."
It's a funny story. But it's also the norm.
A lot of leaders think culture comes from a poster on the wall or a paragraph on the website.
And if your core values aren't driving that behavior, they're just decoration.
What Happens When Core Values Are Just Words
We hear it all the time from the owners we work with:
"I've got people who are really good at their jobs but are a nightmare to work with, and nobody wants to deal with it because we need their skills."
"It feels like there are two sets of rules around here. Some people get held to a standard and others get a pass."
"I can't seem to find good people, and the ones I have don't seem to care about this company the way I do."
These aren't strategy problems. They're core values problems.
When values aren't defined, aren't lived, and aren't used to make decisions, they can't do any of the things they're supposed to do. Like guide hiring, drive accountability, create the culture that attracts and retains the kind of people you actually want on your team.
Where Core Values Fit in Your Business Operating System
In the Accelerate Your Business™ model, core values sit inside the People pillar alongside Organizational Structure and Performance Expectations.
They're one of three components that determine whether you have the right people in the right seats, doing work that aligns with how your company operates.
Your values become the filter for who you bring in, how you evaluate performance, and how you make the hardest decisions. (Like letting go of someone who's technically excellent but is poisoning the team around them.)
That's why Day 1 of our work with clients starts with People: clarifying the core values that drive culture, hiring, and accountability.
Because without that foundation, none of the other work sticks.
How to Operationalize Your Core Values
Operationalizing means turning a word on the wall into a behavior you can see, coach, measure, and hold people accountable to.
Here's how.
1. Define the behaviors, not just the value.
People can't act on a word. They can act on a behavior.
For each core value, write 3–5 observable behaviors that bring it to life. Put it on one page.
If it takes a paragraph to explain, it won't survive Tuesday.
For example, one of our core values at The Resultants® is "Accountability Through Fearless Leadership." Here's what that looks like in practice:
Seizing the moment within a team meeting to voice the elephant in the room.
Reading the room and positioning the right questions at the right time.
Making decisions in the best interest of the organization based on values, not pressure from the loudest person in the group.
That level of specificity is what makes it coachable.
You can say: "When you're living this value, it looks like this. When you're not, it looks like this."
2. Leaders go first.
If the leadership team isn't living the values, nobody else will either.
Leaders should regularly take stock of their own actions against the defined behaviors.
If you can't honestly say you're upholding a core value, it's not a value you can ask others to follow.
This is where our Personal Performance Evaluation (PPE™) becomes a powerful tool. It includes a structured way to review core values alignment alongside position requirements and goals.
3. Use values to make relationship decisions.
Every stakeholder needs to understand your values: employees, clients, vendors, new hires. And you need to base relationship decisions on values alignment.
That includes the hardest call in business: what to do with the person who's great at their job but terrible for the culture.
We see this in almost every company we work with. The answer has to be the same every time. Values win, or they mean nothing.
4. Build values into every people system you have.
Recruitment. Onboarding. Performance reviews. One-on-ones.
Values should show up everywhere people are being evaluated, developed, or given feedback.
When they're woven into the operating rhythm of the business (weekly meetings, quarterly resets, annual planning) they stop being something you "roll out" and start being something your team just does.
5. Start meetings with a value.
Sixty to ninety seconds: name the value, read the behaviors, share one example from last week.
That's it. Simple, fast, and it keeps values front and center in the daily rhythm of the business.
6. Recognize specific behavior, not just results.
When someone acts out a value in a visible way, name it. Tie your recognition to the specific behavior, not just the outcome.
"Sue, thanks for staying with that customer until it was resolved. That's Customer Focus in action."
It takes only a minute. And it reinforces the behaviors you want to see repeated.
7. Keep reviewing and refining.
Make it a point to regularly review your core values definitions with your team.
Someone will more than likely offer a perspective that requires reaffirming or reassessing a point. That's healthy.
Values aren't set-and-forget. They need to be a living part of how your team talks about expectations.
Most companies don't fail because of bad strategy. They fail because they tolerate bad habits.
It takes time and effort to go beyond the words on the wall.
But the companies that do this well? Their issues list shrinks. Engagement goes up. Leaders get time back. People feel their work matters and enjoy who they work with.
Most companies don't fail because of bad strategy. They fail because they tolerate bad habits.
Operationalizing your values is how you stop tolerating them.
If it feels like a daunting project, make it a strategic goal. Start with one value. Apply it to some of these steps.
Over time, I know you will see the difference.
The companies that operationalize their values build the most durable competitive advantage there is: great people who are fully engaged in a mission that matters.
That's the kind of workplace people wake up wanting to join.
If that's the company you want to lead, let’s talk.
