AMS-IAC Company Values
With a family business background a number of core values came to mind when we started to review who we were and what our business stood for. These included integrity, trust, ethics, loyalty, commitment, honesty, flexible and fair.
In addition, we were also embarking an a strategy change which had a social responsibility, environmental and people focus. This presented us with even more great words that seemed to sum up our thoughts.
With our extensive “short list” we applied our engineering problem solving to reduce the selection down to two. We believed these two were needed to underpin any business operation if long term success* was to be achieved.
(*define success as you will, thats a discussion for another day!)
We didn’t want our values to simply be two words that were written in our company strategy document and posted on our website. It was important that these values were integrated into the company. To do this, we needed to be able to “live” the values and describe to the people in the company how to do this.
For each value we have created a list of behaviours that people can adopt to help the company successfully achieve the them.
Trustworthy
Defined in the Oxford English Dictionary as:
This was an easy one to include. To be trustworthy you have to incorporate so many of the other values we reviewed.
As straight forward as it was to choose, it can be one of the hardest to achieve. Trust needs to be earned, and this can only be done over time.
With the pandemic changing how people operate, face to face contact with the people we work with has reduced significantly. The reduced personal interactions has made the development of trust even harder. A greater emphasis must now be on performance, with the relationships evolving over a longer period.
Trustworthy Behaviours:
“I am fair with negotiations and not afraid to share reasoning”
“I own my mistakes, apologise, and make amends”
“I’m aware of my competencies and limitations and willing to ask for help”
“I do what I say I am going to do”
I choose to do what is right over what is fast, fun, easy or comfortable”
Collaborative
Defined in the Oxford English Dictionary as:
Not such an obvious value, but when done well with trust in place, it can take a lot of the stress out of modern working and make being at work more enjoyable.
We promote collaborative working amongst staff, with our supply partners, shareholders, the local community and of course, with our customers.
Understanding what made some of our customer and personal working relationships successful helped with the selection of this value. As did the nature of previous supply agreements, which had expectations to meet targets rather than solve customer problems.
Collaborative working is at the heart of what has made our successes so far. We are lucky to have found some great suppliers, like our machining company Bindon Engineering who hold our casting stock and enable us to implement a just in time delivery for engineered to order products.
To offer a customer the best solution for a problem, you need the flexibility to be able to look outside your own organisation. Often the best answer can be provided by working with others.
Collaborative Behaviours:
“I’m flexible”
“I bring meaningful strategy and ideas to the team vs just following directions”
“I invest time and resources to enhance the effectiveness of the team”
“I am mindful of other peoples time”
“I don’t overpromise and I’m able to deliver on commitments and balance competing priorities”
“I recognise the team is made of of the unique skills and qualities each individual brings”
“I work on my short-term goals to drive progression towards our longer term goals”