Blog #32: Mission: possible

For years, we at Med-X-Press have had a mission statement that describes the principles of our cooperation within the company and in relation to our customers and business partners. Self-critical reflection has now led us into a process of reviewing and readjusting our corporate philosophy. Aspects such as corporate identity, employer branding and employee loyalty played a role here, which we put to the test in extensive discussions and ultimately it was a matter of filling the three keywords vision, mission and values with content.

Values determine our actions

Let me start with values. Are there not sufficient foundations for a value-based coexistence? There is the UN with its human rights conventions, the humanistic world view, Christian values and, in Germany, the Basic Law. That's why I ask myself whether we need to explicitly define corporate values. Corporate reality tells me that you have to! In my (ideal) view, values should naturally form the foundations of every social coexistence anyway: By consensus for all areas of life, regardless of whether we are talking about companies, families, associations or political parties. But these are my personal thoughts. At Med-X-Press, we have decided to take a close look at these issues and define a company-specific set of values. An initial brainstorming session by the management resulted in a cluster of 25 different terms. We agreed on five of them that we consider to be crucial for Med-X-Press.

And these are our five values, which I would like to present to you briefly.

1. appreciation

For us, appreciation is the key to a fulfilling working environment. Based on the needs of our employees and our customers, we believe that appreciation is based on solidarity, transparency, trust and mutual support.

2. respect

Respectful interaction creates the basis for trusting communication, including the acceptance of different points of view. Active listening and an open-ended, constructive exchange promote a harmonious working environment.  

3. reliability

Reliability creates trust and security in the teams and in external business relationships. The experience of reliable action strengthens cooperation and ultimately the success of our company.

4. commitment

Taking responsibility and standing by decisions and actions are the prerequisites for creating a culture of trust and authenticity with which we can achieve our goals.

5. clarity

With the value of clarity, we achieve transparency and support each individual employee in understanding their role and realizing their full potential. We see this as a solid foundation for long-term and successful relationships with our customers and business partners.
 

Values and standards

As I was writing this, I involuntarily thought of the school subject "Values and Standards".  When I think about it, it fits the topic quite well, because values are defined as general objectives, while standards are set out in binding legal regulations. We have enough of the latter in pharmaceutical logistics and healthcare. But this legislative framework also determines our business activities to a large extent. This is a good transition to our vision and the mission of our company. I don't want to repeat the famous quote attributed to former Chancellor Helmut Schmidt, you know it and I don't need to emphasize that I don't agree with his assessment. Having a vision is synonymous with setting a goal, not a short-term goal, but a long-term goal. In developing these statements, we also looked beyond the horizon and took a close look at the big tech companies. What vision do the global players follow? Is this a benchmark for us?  

Vision

In our considerations, we have focused on the topic of health, because "health is the basis for a happy and fulfilled life", as we have formulated it. We see our responsibility in the reliable supply of medicines and healthcare products to patients - safely and promptly. Our goal is to be the market leader in pharmaceutical logistics - nationally and internationally with know-how and continuous further development of all business areas. From this we derive: "We make the world healthier and happier!"

Mission

How can we realize this scenario? We gain the drive and motivation for this from our mission, which does not describe a visionary project, but rather its implementation, the path to the goal. It characterizes our corporate purpose, including the values we have defined. We promote a positive working atmosphere and can thus support a high level of identification among all employees. 
Let me try to sum it up in one sentence: we live our values, follow our mission and can achieve great things in the future.

I have outlined our principles and ideas in this blog post, but of course our guidelines have not been set "from above". Our employees were involved in all processes and were able to contribute criticism, approval or specific change requests, because that is precisely part of our corporate philosophy. And I can tell you that the comments were very varied and very constructive.
 

That is why I am particularly interested in how this topic is communicated in your company. What values have you defined, what is your mission and vision?

I look forward to your feedback! Please write to me!