Culture Club

The Pedestal Source/Xylem Design Culture Club is not for fans of obscure 80’s bands.  It’s not that kind of Culture Club.  But we did have our second meeting of what we call the Culture Club last week.  While it’s certainly an opportunity to hang out and have a meal with our ultra-cool co-workers, and to discuss a few of the ins and outs of the pedestal business,  it’s really more about sitting down as a group and not only discussing what the culture of our company is, but moving towards the definition of what the culture will be.  This is achieved through defining our values; first individually, then collectively.  Each employee has been given a long list of values and asked to rank each one in order of importance.  Then, after everyone’s thoughts and opinions are heard, our fearless leader Greg Glebe will take a lot of the input and formulate it into the “Stone Tablets” that reflect his values for the company.

The #1 rule of the Culture Club is this:  Leave Your Ego At The Door!  The ego is always and only self-serving. We value serving each other and serving our customers and vendors.  The #2 rule of the Culture Club is this:  Don’t forget about rule #1!  This is part of what we call the “basic” values: honesty, integrity, kindness, respect, and humility. Without the starting point of these basics, the discussion of our cultural company values is a moot point.  So when our employees bring these basics with them, we have a good, common starting point.

Greg came up with the idea of the Culture Club, and believes that by defining what we value, we can move more intentionally towards nurturing a culture that draws the best out of everyone.  As the meeting progresses, certain values rise to the top. Values like:  “Wowing the Customer”, “Over-communicating”, “A Fun Work Environment” and a desire for “Continuous Self-Improvement”.  As we move forward with our Culture Club meetings, we hope to move closer and closer to defining what that culture will look like. Because ultimately, culture is the key and values are the constant point of reference that great cultures are built on. Making pedestals may be the nuts and bolts of our business, but our mission is so much more.