In a company, actually a term of teamwork may be important but not necessarily a core value. It is really a by-product of another value. Likewise, we may have an emotional connection to building customer relations. Again, is this a value or something else? What happens when e-business becomes the norm and the personal component of the customer service relationship is diminished from its present form? While these items are important to the functioning of your business, they are transitory, too. From that case, you can consider the business emphasis and how it evolves and changes. We need to move to another dimension of sophistication to understand values. This new level of emphasis is on core values.
The concept of core values means reaching a certain level of understanding of what is more permanent. While teamwork and quality are important transitory operational values, they do not reach deep enough into the roots of your story. To capture your values as part of your story, you need to have frank discussions with your team to determine what is really important to you, your team, and your business. From the discussion you need to develop a list of core values. Keep it a short list, say, around four or five items. Too many values on the list seem to dissipate the importance of the list. It becomes a tedious code of conduct for employees to remember. People seem to be able to relate better to a few core values than to a long list.