For the last several months we have been working on a very important internal project here at JB Media Group — who we are as a company. It’s one thing to know what you offer your clients, how to adapt to changes in your industry and how to communicate both of those things. It’s another thing entirely to know what place you want to have in the world and how you plan to get there at a very core level. I’m not talking about grand visions or even strategic plans. I mean what you stand for, the impact you want to have and what drives the hundreds of decisions made every day in the course of a business
Identifying Core Values — Our Process
Gaining clarity on who we are a company meant starting at the foundation — our collective values. Identifying and defining the core values of a group of people is a process that requires patience, strong communication, clear intention and trust. Founder Justin Belleme elected to bring in Glenn Geffken and Maria Rueda of BalancedIs to guide us through the process. After meeting with individual members of the team and a facilitated full company conversation, we identified the following as our company core values. These principles are the foundation of our company culture and guide communications internally and externally, project selection and hiring decisions.
Presenting…. JB Media’s Company Values!
We have also defined each value to be clear on what it means to and for us. We’ve had these values posted in our office for a few months now, have shared with them with candidates for open positions, talked about them several more times as a team, used them to evaluate new projects and are now working to reflect them in all of our documents, processes and systems.
Clarity to Guide Our Work
Now that we have our values, we have clarity on what our company culture is about and how best to care for it. Culture requires continuous nurturing, particularly during periods of intense growth. We’re also working on a mission statement, ways we can support and collaborate with area non-profits and future plans that will help us live our values. While this is internal work to who we are and how we do business, we feel it is important to share with our clients, partners and community. Transparency is one of our values, after all.
