Writing Archive Aug 23, 2024

Core Values are Pointless Without Teeth

Core values, eh?

At their best, the statements should capture the company’s unique behavior in a few words. They should be repeatable. They’re “memes” in the original sense of the word.¹

an element of a culture or system of behavior passed from one individual to another by imitation or other nongenetic means.

But if the values don’t have teeth, they’re pointless.

Why value “integrity” if you’re willing to do shady growth hacks or tracking?

Why even say “we are smart,” like Snap Inc. does?² I mean… isn’t every company full of smart people?

In contrast, OpenAI’s unique “AGI Focus” core value³ helps employees make decisions.

Anything that doesn’t help with [safe, beneficial Artificial General Intelligence] is out of scope.

Whether you agree with OpenAI’s methods or not, at least that’s a very specific, unique, and clear core value.

I like to think I live my life consistent with a set of principles. Sure, there are some exceptions. My wife recently noted it’s odd I speed when I’m a law-abiding citizen everywhere else.

Likewise, I want my micro venture studio, here & co., to do its business from a base set of values. It’s just me for now. But, these values could attract like-minded partners and customers.

These values should have teeth.

I’m not sure who first came up with “even/over” statements, but the framing is my favorite way of conveying values. The pattern is

We value [a good thing] even over [another good thing].

I’ve always found the phrase “even over” unintuitive, so I just say “over”.

The idea is that if we reversed the two things, it could also be valid. We don’t want to say, “we value a good thing”, we want to say, “look, we know this other thing is valuable, but push come to shove… we have to go with the other thing.”

here & co. values

I spent time crafting some value statements for here & co., which you can read over there, but I’ve copy/pasted them below too:

Craftsmanship (over profit)

Well-made, useful products are an end in themselves, regardless of the money they make.

Optionality (over profit)

No investors, no board, no golden handcuffs. We get to choose our own path.

Mutual Good (over getting ahead)

There’s room for all of us to succeed. No zero sum games. No warfare metaphors.

Respect (over cunning)

No manipulation, hacking, or hustle: just good, honest business between humans.

The Marathon (over sprints)

We’re making consistent, deliberate progress instead of chasing the trends.

Again, it’s not that the second item in the pairing is bad. (Profit is good! So is stability!) It’s that we value the first thing more, sometimes at the expense of the (also good) second thing. You can imagine a company that values profit over craftsmanship, and that’s just fine. It’s just not me.

The values aren’t perfect. I’m sure I’ll keep tweaking them.

That’s okay. I value the journey over the destination.