There is only one thing that attracts the talent: Next Generation culture
Companies with talent-focused cultures attract the best talent there is. Great talent delivers value creation to customers and to shareholders. Great performance in the end brings new opportunities for everyone. So, can we assume that creating a great culture is every CEO’s first agenda item? No. Is this only our observation: Not really.
Why not? Because a talent-focused culture is not easy to establish and even more difficult to maintain beyond glossy words strategically placed in corporate documents and hyped-up, humanistic ideals continuously reiterated in video snippets prepared for uninterested social medical audiences.
When a company attempts to establish a talent-flourishing culture, most of the time, they deploy side-way solutions to only deal with what blatantly emerges in the surface. Frequently cliche rationales are used to explain why such solutions are necessary;
“The new generation is different. We need to understand them better”
“We lack a mission statement”
“New generation wants to work for start-ups only. We need to do things like …. happy hours”.
The quotes can go on. Even though few capture the spirit of the issue at hand, corporations keep on producing tons of content only touching the surface of the issue. Talent’s complaints are usually simple and similar. We hear them at town halls, people engagement surveys, coaching sessions etc. The firms are not deaf to these complaints. However, nothing material changes as a result of solutions developed in in long and boring HR feedback sessions; except the CEO’s posts on Instagram where he/she hugs and kisses a few employees during extended happy hour times. The outcome: A firmer confirmation of not paying attention to the root-cause of the problem, but being seen as seeking possible ways to a resolution.
This attitude may, at times, create the talk with the accurate sounding resonance, but does not create the long-winded walk to respond to the needs of the talent.
At Dogma Alares, first and foremost, we believe in developing a set of cultural principles to which we, as employees, managers and shareholders can adhere to during our daily lives. These principles are what will shape our culture going forward. This we believe a well-grounded starting point to demonstrate that we value our talent and we will attend to any issues that may emerge in this front effectively driven by our principles. We focus on three cultural principles:
These principles are developed after listening to many colleagues who were frustrated by the artificial discussions around culture. We designed Dogma Alares so that there is an environment where people can develop themselves during their time here, there is a continuous learning environment resulting in high quality work for the clients, promises given at the workplace are kept to each other and there is a feeling of fairness about decisions. When any of the above goes wrong, there is an open discussion. But everybody should be ready for what is to come… When you ask for an open discussion, you should expect one. When you ask for feedback or a solution to a problem, you should be ready to hear one.
These principles are for starters and we expect our employees, managers and shareholders to enrich them going forward. We think the above principles will have three results for Dogma Alares as a firm and for its talent:
- Center of attraction for the type of talent who value these principles,
- Happy customers,
- Low attrition rate.
There is only one thing that will prove the value of our approach: Relentless adherence to our principles.
However, we should not and will not stop here. We believe that these principles will only mean something when/if they are tested through time in an appropriate work-environment and if they prove to be entrenched well with the relentless faith and the supportive attitudes of the senior team members to upheld and maintain these values.
WE would like to be able to prove the value of our TALK with the way we WALK and adhere to these principles. Therefore, we will publish 6 monthly follow-up stories on our experience with our core values, with the aim to create a platform where such principles are adapted by more firms and perhaps even further developed in time.
Please give us feedback. More experience, more open dialogue, more involvement will enrich us. For the audience who would like to understand more about what we mean by these principles, please see the below table explaining them in more detail:
