maxim
Noun
A short, pithy statement expressing a general truth or rule of conduct.
Carpedia’s 52 Maxims is a collection of ideas that are used to guide the values and behaviors of our company, Carpedia International Ltd. The maxims originated when Carpedia was founded in 1994; at that time, they were called principles. The maxims were based on the wisdom of people who had influenced Carpedia’s founders and were intended to provide insights to new consultants – and to remind more seasoned consultants about certain truisms that are typical in our industry. These “truisms” impart knowledge that was often learned after project and relationship mistakes and breakdowns. The hope was that knowledge, rather than experience, could help someone avoid certain predictable problems.
The maxims were originally part of the company Policies and Procedures Manual, but they tended to be read once and then for- gotten. As the company grew, we started to notice that whenever we got ourselves into trouble on a project, it was almost always because we had not paid attention to one, or a number, of the maxims. Unfortunately, we didn’t know of any good way to teach and reinforce the principles in a systematic manner. We discovered an approach when we first went to work for The Ritz-Carlton Hotel Co. The Ritz-Carlton had a similar concept, which at the time they called The Basics. They had 18 fundamental basics that formed the backbone of the company’s behaviors and culture. What the Ritz did better than anyone we had seen was reinforce these basics daily in their 8:30 a.m. line up. At the line up, everyone in the company spends 15 minutes learning about key events going on in the hotel, special VIP guests, and anything else of particular note. Every day they also discuss one of The Basics, and they share com- pany stories that explain the concept.
We adopted this idea but with our own twist. We simplified the slightly awkward rotation of 18 maxims and created 31 maxims for each day of the month (31 days, 31 maxims). We sent a daily maxim to every employee, which included the concept, an example story, and a reinforcing quote. After a few years, we found that a daily maxim was too frequent, and people were deleting the email without reflecting on the message. So we modified our approach to 52 maxims (one each week). Increasing the number but reducing the frequency now allows us to add to the messages and makes the arrival of a weekly maxim a little more novel, which gives our staff enough time to allow thoughtful reflection on the concept.
We hope you find these 52 maxims as helpful as we do.