Let’s start with an honesty moment: many company values often get designed in silo, written, framed, and then sadly forgotten.
They can sit on websites, desktop backgrounds and office walls which look great but when things get messy — a tough decision , a tempting shortcut, a moment where profit whispers in your ear louder than the principle — that’s when values actually matter and when they should be dialled up, not down.
Here’s the thing: your company values aren’t there for when things are easy. Sure, they help keep people on the straight and narrow and doing the right thing but values are more important than that. They have a hidden agenda. They’re also supposed to be your compass when the whole map is on fire!
Sticking to them means you’re building something that lasts. Not just in terms of reputation, but in a culture people want to be part of. It plays a part in how you attract the right talent, the right clients, and how you earn the kind of respect that can’t be bought with a set of generic values.
This doesn’t mean it’s easy. Sometimes, it might cost you work. You might lose a deal because you didn’t bend. You might walk away from a partnership that didn’t feel right.
“If your values are real, and lived, not just laminated, they’ll always guide you through the tough times“
At We Are BRAVE we’re incredibly lucky to have never needed to do this with a client, but sticking to our values means we did step away from Meta and Instagram because their style and behaviours just didn’t match with ours anymore.
Every time you choose integrity over convenience, you’re actually investing in trust, and trust is the currency that actually compounds. So we want to remind you, don’t treat your values like a checklist, or something that only lives on a website or a team room poster.
Instead, treat them like your company backbone. If they’re really real, and if they’re lived, not laminated, they’ll guide you through the tough times and keep your company human, relatable and most importantly, trusted.
You can learn more about the We Are BRAVE values by clicking here. We use a mnemonic to make them extra easy to remember and implement.
R – Reliable
E – Energising
B – Brave
E – Extraordinary
L – Leading
