It”™s easy to make resolutions. Many are made and few are kept, especially if they are intended to trickle down through an entire corporation or organization. Often much time and resources are spent writing lofty mission statements and defining operating principles, only to hang them on the wall or place them on a website somewhere, without ever managing to actually implement them into practice.
To go beyond the theory and wonderful intentions, every employee needs to establish a personal connection with these goals, as mere slogans conceived with the best of intentions don”™t change the trajectory of a company or organizational culture. It requires genuine commitment and consistency before mission statements or operation principles become inherent corporate values. The principles have to become a way of life, guiding tenets that people take to heart and live by day by day.
At Curtis Instruments in Mount Kisco ”” a privately held international engineering company specializing in integrated systems for electric vehicles ”” we devised a set of 10 Points, our corporate operating principles, about 30 years ago. We took them seriously from day one. The Curtis 10 Points were to express not just who we are as a corporation, but what kind of company we wanted to be in the future, what we believed in and what our ideals were. In large part, this was the combined vision of our founder, Edward M. Marwell and our management team under the guidance of the human resources Vice President Anne Papaelias. For us, these 10 Points are working because they became firm core values.
Our current CEO and company president Stuart Marwell takes great care that we keep to these ideals. His frequent directive is, “Always do the right thing. When in doubt, look at the 10 Points.” That”™s how these principles became part of the Curtis global culture for every employee and manager.
The results are clear: Technical leadership as an American exporter, high employee morale, low employee turnover, reciprocal loyalty between employee and company, a strong positive impact on the local community, steady growth and global sales success. In 2015, the New York State Society for Human Resource Management and the Best Companies Group ranked Curtis as one the top five “Best Companies to Work for in New York” in the large employer category. This was the third time the company has received that award.
We often are asked what we did to achieve such success and we always have the same answer: Our Curtis 10 Points, a unique set of corporate principles that drives product quality, excellence, ethical behavior, global citizenship and community involvement.
The first step to implementing these principles is to believe them intrinsically. The owners and senior management took these points most seriously. They meant every word and were committed to achieve these visionary goals. Curtis communicated and internalized them within the entire organization. Everybody understood: This is who we are. This is how we want to be globally. This is how we want to interact with each other.
THE CURTIS 10-POINTS OPERATING PRINCIPLES:
1. Our people are our most important resource.
2. Our customers are the source of our well-being: every person in the company is responsible for exceeding customer expectations.
3. Our products must embody the best technology that is available, while meeting the needs of our markets.
4. We strive to design and manufacture only one level of quality ”” the highest.
5. Each person in the company is responsible for its progress and each person must share in its success.
6. As a global company, we recognize that strength comes from the diversity of our culture.
7. We believe in a work environment ,which encourages and permits each person a sense of his/her own worth.
8. Relations with colleagues, with customers and with vendors must be conducted with integrity and fairness.
9. Creativity in our engineering and in all aspects of our activities is the most essential ingredient of our progress.
10. Curtis companies are citizens of the larger community and we have a responsibility to contribute to its well-being and progress.
It”™s what we say, what we mean and what we do.
Frank Matheis is director of corporate marketing communications at Curtis Instruments, where he directs the company”™s in-house ad agency to manage global advertising, promotions and communications. He can be reached at 914-242-6615 or by email at matheisf@curtisinst.com.
