Living your values, and the consequences of ignoring them

When staff at Wayfair, the online furniture retailer, walked out because they discovered that the company had sold furniture to detention centres on the US-Mexico border, it demonstrated how important it is for organisations, big and small, to live their values. This is especially true in today's social media driven world. 

Not so long ago this kind of story would probably never have seen the light of day. The employees may have signed a petition.. . or maybe not. Now, with social media reigning, employees, customers, distributors and the market at large have a very loud and important voice. 

Companies that build a brand have to live the values of that brand. It's trite, but it's very true: building a brand takes years, damaging that brand can take seconds. 

The moral of the story is: know the worth of your brand and its core values, and make sure that you live and breathe those values. Your brand and reputation are invaluable so don't forget about the importance of them in the quest for profits, as you may see your profits fall as a result.

last month hundreds of staff from US online retailer Wayfair staged a walkout after discovering that the company had sold $200,000 worth of bedroom furniture to a contractor that runs detention centres on the US-Mexico border.

Industrial action
Online activism in the workplace: How should HR respond? 

Handling industrial action

Staff mobilised support via instant messaging platform Slack and 550 employees signed a letter demanding that Wayfair stopped working with the contractor -– a company called BCFS – and that it established a “code of ethics for B2B sales that empowers Wayfair and its employees to act in accordance with its values”.”