Many organizations spend several full days developing core values, handbooks and policies. It is important work. The difficulty comes after the workshops, when the values need to become something people do on an ordinary Tuesday.
After the workshop
You have led a values workshop at your company. Management and employees have sat together and put into words what you stand for. You have chosen four core values, written a handbook and practiced giving each other positive feedback. Everyone went home satisfied, and the board has been told that the values work is done.
Then everyday life arrives. At the weekly meeting someone asks: “Have we helped each other this week?” Someone answers that they emptied the coffee machine, even though it was not their turn. After a while the question stops being asked. The core values are still on the wall, but they no longer show in what happens.
This is common, and it is rarely a matter of unwillingness. Knowing the core values is simply not enough to change behavior. What makes a difference is what people actually do, how often they do it and what reinforces it.
The question after the workshop
After the workshop comes the question: how do we make sure this shows in everyday work six months from now? Nobody wants the handbook to end up as a desk ornament.
The answer is a small box of habits. You do not need more workshops. You need concrete behaviors, simple reminders and follow-up that takes a few minutes. Here is how you can set it up at your workplace.
Six steps from workshop to everyday work
- Translate each core value into a behavior you can see. “We help each other” becomes “I helped a colleague today”. A behavior that someone can see, count and point to is easier to reinforce than an idea of how things should be.
- Make it easy to remind yourself. One short reminder per day is enough. For a month, everyone writes one line: who did I help today? It takes half a minute and makes the behavior visible.
- One focus at a time. Give the weeks themes. Week one is about giving positive feedback, all week, everyone to everyone. Week two is about helping each other every day. A clear focus each week gives more than four core values at once.
- Measure with one question a week. Every Friday, employees answer a short pulse survey: how do you think our values work is going, for you personally and in your group? The answers show trends long before an annual survey could be sent out.
- Reinforce what happens. Recognize good examples, compete team against team or office against office, and keep shared goals in focus. The reinforcement does not have to be big. It has to come often.
- Follow up with facts in the management team. Instead of asking “have we helped each other?”, management looks at how many have registered, how the pulse survey is developing and which behaviors need more support. Then the follow-up becomes a conversation about what works.
How Bisevo supports the work
In Bisevo you add the behaviors behind your core values as daily tasks, send reminders, run weekly pulse surveys and reinforce with posts, challenges and rewards. The AI agents can produce drafts of both survey questions and behaviors, which you then adjust.
Would you like to see what it could look like for your organization? Contact us and book a 15-minute demo.