Why sticking to 3 Core Values Matters for Your Brand
Your organization already has core values, whether leadership writes them down or not. Teams learn values through what leaders praise, ignore, and reward with promotions and budgets. Writing values down turns invisible rules into shared rules.
Marketing depends on shared rules. Brand trust grows when customers see consistent behavior across sales, service, delivery, and billing. Core values guide behavior when a policy does not cover a situation or when a team faces trade-offs under pressure.
A short list of core values supports three major outcomes:
- People remember the list.
- Leaders repeat the same words throughout the year.
- Teams use the words in real decisions, not only in onboarding decks.
Why More Than 3 Core Values Fail for Most Organizations
Many organizations publish five, eight, or more core values. Each department wants representation. Each leader wants a personal principle included. Workshops produce more words than leaders want to delete. The list keeps growing.
Unfortunately, memory does not grow with the list. Research consistently shows people remember things best in groups of three.
A long values list creates three problems at once.
Problem 1 – Recall Drops
Ask ten employees to list all values without prompts. Answers rarely match once the list goes past three.
Problem 2 – Meanings Drift
Long lists often include overlapping terms such as integrity, ethics, trust, and transparency. Teams struggle to explain differences. Managers coach inconsistently. Employees create personal interpretations.
Problem 3 – Decisions Slow Down
When a team tries to apply seven values to one decision, discussion turns into debate about wording. People fall back on seniority or personal preference.
The Hidden Costs of Too Many Core Values
Onboarding Stays Shallow
Onboarding time stays fixed. More values mean less time for each value. New hires learn definitions, not behaviors.
Culture Signals Fragment
One manager focuses on speed. Another focuses on empathy. Another focuses on ownership. Shared priorities fade across teams.
External Credibility Weakens
A long list raises customer skepticism. Customers test claims through lived experience. Gaps feel larger when the list feels long.
Marketing Execution Loses Focus
Content teams struggle to connect campaigns to a clear value story. Sales teams struggle to repeat the story. Customer support teams improvise a different story.
Examples of Organizations with Five or More Values
HDFC Bank – 5 Core Values
HDFC Bank lists Operational Excellence, Customer Focus, Product Leadership, People, and Sustainability. While manageable on a web page, recall often fails. Sustainability feels disconnected unless leaders explicitly link it to daily decisions.
Kotak Mahindra Bank – 5 Core Values
Kotak’s values include long phrases such as “Down to earth and approachable” and “Ethical with a governance mindset.” Longer phrases reduce recall and weaken shared meaning.
Aditya Birla Group – 5 Core Values
Integrity, Commitment, Passion, Seamlessness, and Speed read cleanly, but overlap in daily coaching conversations unless leaders provide strong examples.
Amazon – 16 Leadership Principles
Amazon’s long list works only because reinforcement systems are rigorous. Hiring, performance reviews, and internal language support the principles. Most organizations lack this level of reinforcement.
Why 3 Core Values Work Better
Leaders Repeat Messages
Leadership communication works through repetition. Repetition requires simplicity. Three values can be reinforced across town halls, reviews, and recognition.
Managers Coach Behaviors
Managers need concrete language. With three values, each one gets room for real behavioral examples.
Teams Face Trade-Offs
Culture shows up in trade-offs, not slogans. Three values force prioritization and clarity.
Measurement Stays Realistic
Three values support a short behavior scorecard. Long lists create scorecards nobody tracks.
How to Keep External Messaging Broad Without Expanding Core Values
Use two layers:
- Layer one: 3 core values — used for internal decisions and performance conversations.
- Layer two: Supporting principles — used for brand tone, community commitments, sustainability, and operating guidelines.
SEO Checks for Your Core Values Page
- Use clear structure with short headings and real examples.
- Repeat the keyword “core values” naturally in the title, intro, and headings.
- Add one behavior example and one decision example per value.
- Link values to customer experience, service, delivery, and issue resolution.
Testing Your Core Values
Run a recall test. Ask fifteen people across functions to list the core values without prompts. Mismatches reveal the real state of shared understanding.
Takeaway
Working memory supports a small number of active ideas—often around three. A three-value limit respects how people learn and decide. Teams remember three. Leaders repeat three. Customers experience consistency more often.