1 - We Have Principles and We Live By Them

~ We Have Principles and We Live By Them ~

This manifesto consists of a set of principles to provoke thought, inspire action, drive us towards a consistent vision of how we work. They are our lifeblood.

Thus, we will always keep our principles on top of mind. We begin and end our days aligned to our principles, and we carry them throughout our days.

We wear them on our sleeves, they are written in our hearts. We know when we violate them because they make us feel uneasy. We recognize these feelings and correct our thinking and behaviors to realign with our principles. Adherence to our principles is a sign of our growth. They provide us a common consciousness, a unified purpose, a collective vision, a camaraderie, a sense of belonging. OUR PRINCIPLES ARE OUR NORTH STAR.

We understand that principles matter to a team. All teams have them. Unfortunately the principles, and the behaviors that come from them, are not always aligned and we know that lack of alignment will have significant implications on the growth, success, and happiness of the team.

We do not make believe that we will have, and maintain perfect alignment with our principles. Humans are complex at the individual level, it compounds at the collective level, and the environment we work in is always changing. New people come into our team. Existing people change. External pressure and stressors come in and distort our thinking and alignment to principles. Thus misalignment is inevitable. This inevitability is precisely why it is critical for us to have principles, and to continuously strive for alignment. We must set our ideal, and we must constantly strive for it.

Thus, as a team, we will all become aware of our principles. We will memorize them and ingrain them into our minds. No, we won’t remind ourselves of the principles annually, quarterly, or even monthly and weekly. We will remind ourselves of them daily. Only through doing this daily will we even succeed at keeping them on top of our mind. Daily, or we will forget. We all know how easy it is to forget.

Through this habitual daily attention to the principles, we will become them. They will release their influence into all of our thinking and behaviors. Our words will be born of them. Misalignment will tug on our feelings when we think or act against them. However, we won’t feel bad or shame, we will acknowledge and correct our misalignment.

We will have no tolerance for excessive misalignment with the principles. They are the lifeblood of our team, thus our acknowledgement and timely correction of misalignment is critical, or we run the risk of working without principles. Actions misaligned with our principles must be identified and addressed at their root. Quickly. Very Quickly.

We certainly will not tolerate malicious misalignment to our principles. We must be cautious to mislabel behaviors as malicious, as to not confuse the behavior with an opportunity for learning. The process of such determination requires thoughtful analysis of the context and consistency of the person’s overall alignment with our principles.

However, if after careful deliberation, such a label is warranted, we will act fast to weed out these individuals as they present significant danger to the collective alignment with the principles. Far too often does such tolerance severely impact the collective.

Whenever we feel lost as an individual, or as a team, we go back to our principles. They are our NORTH STAR. We contemplate them, we ponder them. We use them to think, to reason, to solve the problem at hand, and they show us the path forward. We have found our way.

Our principles are everything. They are WHO we are. They are WHAT we are. They guide our HOW. They drive the WHY. They brought us to where we are. They are shaping our future. They show the way when we are lost. They are our North Star.