Aspirational Culture
The Pulte Institute is committed to placing dignity, quality, and respect at the heart of our organization so that our staff, faculty, students, partners, and global communities have opportunities to flourish. The below culture statement is an articulation of the ideals we strive to embody in our work and will serve to guide us in our present and future projects.
Human Dignity
We place human dignity at the center of our work. We believe that advances in international development should only happen through a human-centered, dignity-affirming design. We are driven by a moral code in which all humans hold equal worth and deserve equal respect, and we do not engage in projects that jeopardize this commitment. As a dignity-affirming organization, we:
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Prioritize the inclusion of marginalized populations in our projects. We create strong relationships within our team and with our partners that not only include but promote the voices of minority members on our team. We strive to design context-informed programs that take into account the needs and challenges facing the most marginalized in a community.
- Seek to build sustainable and equitable projects only. We set expectations for local ownership over project designs, collaborate with our partners to set clear and realistic timeline expectations, ensure equitable pay to sub-grantees, and promote only those projects that bolster rather than burden a community in the long run.
- Walk the talk. We regularly interrogate what it means to be a “dignity-affirming” organization and plan to identify metrics to self-assess whether we are achieving this commitment.
Quality
“We believe that every task should be performed in a superior manner, incorporating the most advanced design, with an unwavering commitment to ethical practice.” This demands that we:
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Operate at the forefront of our field. We work to stay abreast of the most cutting-edge practices and assess their applicability to our work.
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Engage in continuous reflection and learning. We provide opportunities for staff and partner feedback on our Institute’s practices so that we can identify and implement improvement in all activities.
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Ensure staff have the resources they need to produce high-quality work. We facilitate a culture of teamwork and regularly check in on whether employees have enough staffing, time, and support for their projects.
- Recognize and value how diverse voices improve our work. We prioritize incorporating diverse staff and partner contributions to all of our work products.
Impact
Our legacy is our impact on people. Our Institute aims to have a positive impact on the world, on the communities where our research takes place, with our partners, and with our staff. To achieve this, we:
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Plan well. We learn from previous projects and engage local partners and communities in the early stages of a project.
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Work together as a team. We collaborate with each other and with partners in respectful and equitable ways, valuing each other’s well-being and personal/professional growth.
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Communicate our findings. We disseminate results through robust channels to a variety of audiences. We prioritize sharing our findings with policymakers and local communities.
- Measure our impact. We use trusted and meaningful metrics to measure our academic and policy impact. We are identifying metrics to measure our impact on areas central to the Pulte Institute culture, such as integral human development and respectful local partnership.
Equitable Partnerships
We are committed to equitable partnerships, recognizing our partners as those best prepared to bring about effective and sustainable change to development challenges. We believe that in order to create a level playing field and affirm the dignity and agency of our partners, we must:
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Understand our partners’ needs, interests, and goals. We are committed to building strong relationships with our partners. We engage partners in our planning, especially seeking to diagnose the real needs and goals of partners through collaborative processes.
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Support our partners. We invest our resources into administrative capacity and support for local partners. We represent the needs and interests of partners, especially to donors and other organizations.
- Critically assess our adherence to our principles of equity. We establish and follow a set of institutionalized standards for equitable partnerships. We assess the inclusion of marginalized groups and partner personnel in research teams.
- Promote partners. We utilize our position to facilitate opportunities for partners and to foster connections among partners. We encourage partners to author and own deliverables and spotlight their successes.
Staff Well-being
We support our staff as whole persons rather than just employees, and we are committed to supporting each other’s well-being inside and outside the workplace. As part of our commitment to achieving this, we:
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Are supportive of each other’s personal responsibilities and needs. We have a flexible work policy that allows staff to work certain days from home and emphasize that emails do not need to be answered outside of work hours.
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Recognize and support the needs and identities of international staff. We support staff who are relocating to campus from outside the United States, and we acknowledge various international holidays that our team members celebrate.
- Provide resources for staff professional development. We offer resources and working time for professional development and encourage staff to continue learning and growing.