Xactly was founded 16 years ago on our 4 C.A.R.E. values. Get to know Xactly's core culture in this post about one of our C.A.R.E. values—"A" for Accountability.
Xactly’s offices across the globe are participating in the company’s inaugural C.A.R.E. Week. From San Jose and Denver to Canada, Europe and India, every team member will be participating in both internal and community service events that celebrate our culture and commitment to each other and the areas in which we work and live. Xactly founder and CEO, Christopher Cabrera is kicking off each day talking about how C.A.R.E. was established as Xactly’s core values and what each letter means to the company.
In yesterday’s post, I shared the history of how C.A.R.E. came to be at the center of Xactly’s core values and what the first letter, “Customer Focus” means to us. Our next value is Accountability. Again, you may be saying this is not rocket science…and it’s not. That’s the beauty of it. Prior to my Xactly days, I was a sales leader at a well-known tech company. What I found is that everyone was perpetually late. Late to meetings, late on a project, late on pretty much everything. Worse yet was it was totally acceptable. That was just the “company way."
When I founded Xactly, this was a behavior that just wasn't going to fly. For starters, it shows a blatant disrespect for your colleagues and customers. It screams “my time is more important than yours.” The criticality of accountability is one of the first things that is drilled into new hires the minute they start with the company. And it goes well beyond showing up to meetings on time. Xactly has a meritocracy-based system where employees are held accountable for their performance and actions. For example, our employees are on compensation and objective plans.
Employees work closely with their managers to set goals that are reasonable and achievable – and they are held accountable for reaching those targets. While there will always be evolving circumstances and situations, every employee has total transparency into what is expected and are responsible for getting the job done. Most importantly, we expect employees to be accountable to their word.
I can’t count the times over my career I have heard company leaders flat out lie about what they can or will deliver. I would rather lose a deal than win by making a customer believe our products do something they don’t or we can solve a problem we can’t. In business, such as life, relationships that start off with dishonesty rarely work out. And for both our customers and employees, our goal is to be in this together for the long haul. In fact, our very first customer we acquired 16 years ago is still one of our biggest customers today.
This is a testament to the accountability we have shown to them in terms of our service and products. American businessman and author of “7 Habits of Highly Effective People,” Stephen Covey was quoted as saying “Accountability breeds response-ability.” I couldn't agree more. When you have a culture that is based on accountability – and doing what you say you are going to do – for the company, for your customers and for yourself, the rest seems to fall into place.
