Core values should be the deeply ingrained principles that guide all actions of a company. They should serve as its cultural cornerstones that are inherent and sacrosanct. That means core values can never be compromised, either for convenience or short-term economic gain. A true test of whether a company is working by core values should be the way that its people conduct business with customers, vendors and fellow employees.
Eldridge Core Values
In a previous blog post, we defined our core values as:
- Positivity
- Integrity
- Balance
- Communication
- Service
We chose to publicly state these as our core values not because they sounded good. We did it because they have truly stemmed from the way that the founders of Eldridge conducted business. These core values have been reflected in every decision that has been made during the 76 years that we have been in business.
Working by Core Values
Like most companies, we have employee policies and accounting policies that specifically define some of the dos and don’ts of working at Eldridge. What we don’t have are a strict set of operating policies on how to conduct business with customers and vendors. Instead, we tell our employees that every decision they make is the right one and every way that they act is the right way if it can be held accountable to our core values. That may seem like a lot of freedom to give someone, but it can be limiting and painfully to stick to the core values.
Here is recent example of how one of our employees made the right decision even though it was painful. A customer called to say that they had remaining capital budget that they wanted to spend in 2021 or they would lose it. Unfortunately, what they wanted were long lead time fans that couldn’t be delivered by year-end. What the customer proposed we do was to ship them anything that was in stock. Then they would return the incorrect equipment in exchange for the correct equipment in 2022. The amount of the sale made it very hard to say no. But our salesman made the right decision and politely declined to do the deal.
Conclusion
At Eldridge, we just don’t consider our core values to be the way that we view our business environment. We also consider them to be the way that we want customers and vendors to view Eldridge. It is our hope that if ever someone feels that we are not abiding by our core values, that they will let us know so that we can do better in the future.