Can a leopard change his spots? – Can an Organization “create a new set of values”?

Theoretically we can take on new values, but I believe this is unlikely as values are like the centring weight of a pendulum. We bond ourselves to a set of values by our response to life experience and culture. Looking at Organization values, these will be formed or reproduced out of the most influential person or the sheer weight of numbers with a certain leaning.

For an organization to “change values” is a profound ambition! It can be done but requires a major shift at core level, not an intellectual decision. It will take deep conviction to ‘re-weight’ of the group ‘pendulum’. But apart from at that deliberate and purposeful approach, a “new list of values” can only be lipservice.

The danger of an organization waving around new, unfamiliar values as their own which their behaviour contradicts, is that it creates cynicism – which will be worse than the original ‘default’ condition. So without commitment to genuine change, better to recognize your organization’s true values and move together with the people who thrive under one’s same values.

As an added note – Values differ from Principles – which are objective, external and immovable. We can’t break principles, but violating them will break us. Using the clock analogy, Principles are like Time, which we cannot control but can only measure, leverage or use.