Why a Values-Led Business Matters in Executive Search

We hear so much about company values but how many actually live and breathe by them? We recently met the Group HR Director for an international organisation who said they assess candidates against their strong set of 5 core company values but then could only tell us 2 of them!!

We have always been a values-led company at Collingwood and a few years ago we decided that we wanted a client portfolio that aligned to these. We felt that an alignment would ensure that we build collaborative partnerships with like minded organisations and together we could achieve great things. Besides this, we just wanted to work with people that valued their employees, their well-being, their future prosperity, their mental health and were authentic and transparent in the way they operated.

This has been a tough transition for us, we have declined working on prosperous contracts but the result has been amazing. We love our clients and our team will go to the end of the earth to deliver excellence and delight them.

More recently, we have actually had 2 large companies in the construction sector approach Collingwood as they were looking for an executive search partner who aligned to their values!

Benjamin Franklin was correct when he said, “We stand at the crossroads, each minute, each hour, each day, making choices. We choose the thoughts we allow ourselves to think, the passions we allow ourselves to feel, and the actions we allow ourselves to perform. Each choice is made in the context of whatever value systems we have selected to govern our lives. In selecting that value system, we are in a very real way, making the most important choice we will ever make . . . .”

It has been the bravest but best decision we have ever made in our 14 years at Collingwood.