Get Back to Great: Spreading Your Core Values Like Wildfire to Achieve Company Goals
Wisetail | 7 min read
Using Your LMS to Reignite the Spark and Get Back to Your Core
When you think of what keeps companies moving forward, you may consider timelines and agendas, product development, or even numbers. While these elements play a large role in overall success, diving deeper will reveal what gives companies their competitive edge. The core of a company is where you will discover the fundamental beliefs and fire that allows individuals to operate with a singular mentality and approach. These core values provide scaffolding and consistency for employees, and when applied universally, can ensure individual and collective growth. So how do you reignite the spark when your company has drifted from their core?
Core Values During Rapid Expansion
Link Property Management is a rapidly growing real estate and property management company, based out of Columbus, Ohio. While dealing with thousands of people, their company has developed a compassionate mindset when it comes to supporting their employees and residents. Link takes pride in providing opportunities for growth, long-term stability, and the nurturing environments needed to foster positive outcomes. It seems only right that their company values reflect this mentality, and that they act as the supportive backbone for their business.
Their five major values include:
- Always ask why. Stay curious because curiosity reveals opportunity. Constantly seek new information, new insights and question the status quo. Value each other’s diverse perspectives and experiences.
- Make authenticity a daily practice. Choose to show up as authentic selves every day. Engage in meaningful conversations, consciously listen with an open mind. Be an expert in the field, but approachable in attitude.
- Own the outcome. Act as an owner and hold oneself accountable for results. Have a bias for action and don’t wait for others to tackle problems. Take smart risks, try new things and encourage creative ideas.
- Play for each other. Show up for each other, trust one another and treat each other with respect. Create fun, memorable experiences and strong relationships. Building this company for each other, together.
- Take actions that inspire. Adopt and embody admirable behaviors. Value hard work and dedication. Do what’s right and let results speak for themselves.
These values have helped Link in their goals of expansion by creating an enticing place for employees to work. Two years ago, Link Property Management was home to 55 employees. This January, their roster increased to 140 and in August of 2022, they added another 60 people to bring their total Link employee community to 200!
As you can imagine, this exponential growth led to a strain on HR resources and their onboarding process. To complicate matters further, there are a lot of real estate related policies to convey and a great deal of turnover within the industry. All of these factors culminated in a high stress environment, with difficulty tracking compliance, and uncertainty surrounding the effectiveness of onboarding.
Their Learning and Development Manager, Kristen Vaughan, said it best: “the housing industry has teeth.”
Their previous learning process was segmented, and updated information was conveyed in lengthy videos. This made it difficult for employees to learn about necessary industry standards, and to promote the company methodology that assists in tackling complex issues. “Who has time to watch a three hour long video when there are literal fires to deal with?”
So surfaced the inherent question: How do you ensure core company values are being upheld in a company that is growing so rapidly?
Using an LMS to Reignite Core Values
By hiring a Learning and Development professional and investing in a configurable LMS, Link Property Management was thrilled to find that the learning process was more fluid, and resources were more accessible. Their core values were more consistently highlighted, and important legal information was absorbed and dispersed appropriately throughout the company. This drastically increased overall compliance to 50%! With this shift, Link could be certain that employees were retaining important information, including housing policy, courses on human trafficking and how to navigate precarious situations.
Link also chose to integrate their Intranet directly with their new LMS so employees have to log in every day to complete daily tasks. This immediately created a direct pathway for learning materials, and increased the visibility of company standards. This resulting visibility allows their employees to readily reference cultural and informational materials, and ensures daily tasks are in alignment with company values. To continue these trends of growth and accessibility, their company plans to add entry points for increased access, and are establishing their LMS as a necessary part of daily work life.
What’s more, by increasing the visibility and compliance to their core values, Link has been able to amplify their primary goal: to make the world a better place for both their residents and employees. With this focus displayed and regularly reiterated on their LMS, it is in the forefront of every employees’ mind. Implementing a focus upon core values allows Link’s employees to spearhead company-wide goals with a singular mentality and approach. This allows Link to address broad goals in a much more effective and efficient manner, and will ensure that more of their community goals are met long term.
Fanning the Flame
By utilizing their LMS, Link Property Management effectively fanned the flame and spread their core values like a wildfire. Their integration of learning pathways and their emphasis upon company culture has resulted in greater consistency and compliance, and understanding of industry standards. This allows employees to more confidently display valuable traits such as individuality, curiosity, and teamwork, and ensures long term opportunities for individual and collective growth.
