A short podcast episode (Doing Business Like a Woman) in which the host discusses the importance of explicit business values as a decision-making compass, a tool for shaping client experience, and a hiring/culture guide. The host describes a simple, practical process to brainstorm and narrow values (from ~20 down to 3–5) and shares her four core values: expertise, honor, generosity, and joy. She emphasizes that values should be living and actionable, not static corporate slogans.
Welcome.
I am marketing expert and business coach Melissa Kellogg Lueck. And this is the Doing Business Like a Woman podcast, where we are exploring and teaching you how women are reinventing the way business is done and money.
Is made to help you create greater.
Impact and financial freedom one business at a time.
Well, hey there, lady. How's it going? I hope you're having a fabulous day or start to your day. I am doing pretty well. I am in the midst of recovering from a cold, so if you notice that, you know, deep, resonant part of my voice, that's what that is. It reminds me if you're a fan of the sitcom Friends, if you remember Phoebe and when she had a cold and she sang with her guitar in the coffee shop, when she sang Smelly Cat, do you remember that? With her deep voice? She loved that. And she was like her sexy voice. So I'm like, oh, maybe this is my sexy voice. Anyhow, moving on, today we're going to talk about business values. And if you've listened to me for any length of time, you probably have picked up on the fact that I love simplicity. And so spending any time on corporate type things is not really my jam. But I have found that, that as I have grown, as my business has grown, there are some corporate things that I really appreciate. And having business values and having explicit business values is one of them. So I wanted to talk with you about that today. And so just bear with me and my voice here. We're going to do the best with what we've got. Um, so why are business values important? Really? For me, they are like, they've become like my business identity and my compass and like the instrument I use and pointing me in the direction I want to be going in all aspects of my business and my marketing and my communications, business values are my guiding light in making decisions. So, for example, like, if I'm thinking about pricing or whether I want to say yes to an opportunity or a collaboration, or even to having guests on this podcast, right? I filter it all through these business values that I have. So my values also show up in my marketing and how I talk about my business, how I create offers and all the decisions that I make around those offers. My business values are also weaved into how I talk about the work that I do. And they also help us so much in hiring. Right, or and creating our business culture. And I have a fantastic team of contractors. I don't have anyone on staff yet, but even in working with contractors, it can help. Having business values can help you in choosing and who you want to work with and what's important to them and helping them understand what's important to you as a client. So our business values can also help us create the client experience that we want our clients to have when they work with us, right? Like all through the onboarding process and the experience they have all throughout the time that they're working with us, and then when they off board, when they're done working with us, the values that we have flow through that entire client experience. So we are creating an intentional experience for our clients all along the way. And so I have found that now that I have made explicit my business values, I refer to them when I'm developing new things and whether I filter, you know, all these ideas that I have through my business values, and it helps me just to decide whether it's a good idea or not. So I really am a huge proponent and I've done this work for myself and with many of my clients around this idea of values. And it doesn't have to be some, you know, big, lengthy process, the process of creating your values. I mean, this is all inside of you already, right? The who you are, the way you do business, it's already inside of you. It's just kind of bringing it out and making it explicit so that you can share these with other people so that you can run everything you're doing through these values. So it doesn't have to be a big, long, drawn out process. You could probably, you know, if you're in a place listening to this podcast, you could probably just create your values, you know, as you're listening or immediately following, right? So I'm going to share with you my process, which I, as you know, will be quite simple because that's the way I do things. So first what I did is I just listed all the values that are important to me without trying to narrow them down or question them. Just like all the things that I think are important in how I carry out my mission, how I work, things that are important to me about how I operate, right? So I asked myself some questions. So here's some of the questions that I asked myself. You can ask yourself, in what ways do I want to carry out my mission or the change I want to make in this world, right? So I know what my mission is. I know what the purpose of my business is. And so the values is, like, how I want to carry that out, right? So I asked myself, what is the experience that I want to offer every single person that comes in contact with my business, whether they become a client or never become a client or work with me or I work with them or, you know, anyone that comes in contact with my business, I want them to have this, you know, particular experience with me in my business. Also, what are the ways of being and behaving that are of utmost importance to me as a CEO and that I want my team to carry forward? Right? And having these values will help your team members to make decisions on their own, Right? Because they can kind of run through this filter and say, oh, I know that she would want me to do things this way because this is our values, right? So you create this list, and it's just a brainstorming list. Whatever comes up, whatever feels good, just put it all down there. Then you want to look back on that list for any shoulds. Like, oh, well, I should put, you know, honesty, right? Or I should put whatever and get rid of those. Just get rid of those. And then after brainstorming, I personally ended up with a list of about. Of about 20 values. And I wanted my goal to be to narrow it down to about three to five core values so that it just keeps it simple, right? And then so when you go back through that list, you'll see things that could be together or are like different words for the same thing. So, for example, one of my core business values is honor. Like, I always want everyone that comes in contact with my business to feel honored, but that also, for me, encompasses like integrity, honesty, and respect, right? So I didn't have to have integrity, honesty, and respect as separate values because I roll all of that into honor. So you can eliminate or roll all of those into one word, and that will help you eliminate down. And then. And then I had to just choose which are the few that run consistent throughout who I am, how I work, how I want my company to be, and how I want to make my mission happen. Right? So for me, that was. So here's the. Let's see, what do I have four core business values that I ended up with? And so the other point I want to make is that these are not written in stone. You do not have to go to the top of the mountain like Moses did and carve them into stone, right? These are fluid. You can add to them, you can subtract, you can change them. This is just some, you know, a starting point this first time around, right? Or if you have created business values in the past, you may want to take them out, dust them off, and make sure they are something that's a Living, breathing thing, right? That, that are not like Dilbert words. You know, I remember. I don't know if you remember the comic strip Delbert and he would always make fun of, like, these mission statements and stuff. So this is not what we're going for. We're going for a living, breathing set of values that we. That permeate us in our business on a daily basis. Right? So for me, the core business values that I ended up with are expertise, like always bringing all of my knowledge and thought, leadership and authority into my business. And I value that. And giving you the best of all I've got. Number two is honor. So like I mentioned before, that for me encompasses integrity and honesty and respect. Honoring my team members, my clients, my appointments, my. Honoring myself too, right? As a CEO, that's something that is a very important value. And number three is generosity. So I always have valued giving more than I'm getting, and I believe that I will never go broke being generous. So generosity is something that I run my business with that in mind. That value underpinning everything. That's why on this podcast, I give it all away, my friends. It's all yours. Right? I don't hold anything back. And then finally, my fourth business value, core value, is joy. And in all things, I always want to be bringing joy. I want to be creating joy for myself, for everyone that comes in contact with my business, just sparking joy in the events that I hold, in the offers that I create, and in the way that I interact with my clients, like having fun and, and having that feeling of joy and never being a. I don't know, I don't know. I feel like it's just a very masculine, like, conquest and seriousness and formality, but just, I always want to bring joy into everything that I do and be an example for what is possible when you do approach your business with joy. And so those are my four. I would love to hear what are yours. And so I just encourage you to do this exercise. Share it with your team members, share it with. You could share it with your clients, you could write a post about it and just allow. It is a great way to just allow more of a fuller and a fuller expression of you to come through in your business and in your marketing, in your communications. So if you have a moment, you could do this right now and have fun with it and let me know how it goes. I would love to hear from you. And that's all I have for you today, my friends. I hope you have a fabulous rest of your day and I hope you enjoy this exercise of putting together these business values and really just stepping forward, stepping further into your identity as a CEO and setting the direction for your business, your team and your clients, and the experience that the world is having with you and your business. All right, have a great day. I'll talk to you next time. Bye.
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