International Food Services Organisation: Values and Culture Reset
The Challenge
An international food services organisation recognised the need to refresh its corporate values and strengthen its culture following significant organisational change. With employees across multiple countries and languages, they aimed to ensure the new values would not only align with their strategic vision but also resonate deeply across all levels of the organisation. A key priority was embedding a culture of empowerment and accountability to support future growth, alongside encouraging employees to reconnect in a hybrid working environment.
Why Culture Impact?
The leadership team sought a collaborative and inclusive approach—not a top-down exercise. They wanted to involve employees in shaping future values to foster genuine buy-in and engagement. Culture Impact was brought in to lead the values refresh and cultural alignment, leveraging our expertise in driving behavioural change and embedding values into organisational systems.
Our Approach
⦁ Understanding the Current Landscape
We started by meeting with the HR Director and executive team to understand the existing culture and why a refresh was needed. Using Barrett’s Culture Values Assessment, we gathered quantitative and qualitative data to identify patterns of behaviour, cultural strengths, and areas for growth. This provided granular insights, including departmental differences, and highlighted opportunities to create alignment.
⦁ Engaging Employees through Workshops
The assessment results formed the foundation for a series of interactive workshops. These sessions:
⦁ Brought employees together across departments to encourage collaboration.
⦁ Explored the survey data to identify challenges and opportunities in the current culture.
⦁ Educated employees on the Barrett Values Model and its relevance to shaping organisational behaviour.
⦁ Engaged participants in defining values aligned with the organisation’s strategic vision.
These workshops gave employees a voice and fostered a sense of ownership over the cultural shift.
⦁ Executive Alignment
The insights gathered from employees were presented to the executive team, who explored their value profiles— individually and collectively. This facilitated open, honest conversations about how their behaviours influenced organisational culture, highlighting blind spots and opportunities to model the values they wanted to embed.
Executives worked collaboratively to align the employee-driven values with the organisation’s strategic direction, creating a unified framework to guide future decisions.
⦁ Culture Champions
A diverse group of employees volunteered to become Culture Champions, acting as internal experts and advocates for the new values. These champions:
⦁ Received in-depth training on Conscious Business principles and the links between culture, behaviours, and systems.
⦁ Conducted conversations across the organisation to understand what enables or hinders key values like collaboration and accountability.
⦁ Partnered with senior leaders to address challenges and promote alignment.
By embedding this unique internal capability, the organisation ensured that cultural progress would be sustained over time.
The Outcomes
⦁ A set of four future-ready values aligned with the organisation’s strategy.
⦁ Enhanced collaboration between leadership and employees, creating a shared language for addressing culture.
⦁ Increased employee engagement, with individuals feeling heard, valued, and invested in shaping their workplace.
⦁ Empowered mid-level leaders and culture champions equipped to sustain and grow a healthy culture.
⦁ Streamlined decision-making processes, improved alignment across teams, and reduced inefficiencies in operations.
What They Said
"This process wasn’t about leadership dictating values. It was a truly bottom-up approach, with employees shaping the culture they wanted to see. Working with Culture Impact was collaborative, flexible, and allowed us to move at a pace that worked for everyone involved." – Project Sponsor
Through a co-creative approach, Culture Impact helped this international food services organisation embed values that will drive behaviours, align culture with strategy, and create a foundation for lasting success. Could your organisation benefit from a similar transformation?
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