Brian Tracy, of my favorite business gurus, once said “When you achieve complete congruence between your values and your goals, like a hand in a glove, you feel strong, happy, healthy, and fully integrated as a person. You develop a kind of courage that makes you completely unafraid to make decisions and take action. Your whole life improves when you begin living your life by the values that you most admire.”
Great business leaders are clear on their mission, vision and values. They know what they stand for – which makes other people want to stand by them — and they are the epitome of those values. Great leaders go out of their way to make their values non-negotiable for achieving their vision of success. Specifically, they define what is and isn’t acceptable on the road to reaching their goals.
The question then becomes, when is the last time you took a good look at your values and how they are affecting the results you are — or aren’t — getting?
Here’s one tip, which will help you get crystal clear on your values, so you can stand out as a Value-Driven Business Leader.
Assess What Values Will be Instrumental to Your Success
Before you take any value assessments, let me address two common concerns:
1) Some of you may be saying, “but Jos, I already have good values.” What’s important to understand is that there is a difference between having good values and being “values-driven.” The difference is that having “good values” is often a reactive approach, whereby you choose to be “good” in face of different circumstances that challenge you and your integrity. On the other hand, being “values-driven” is a proactive approach to designing whatever you’re doing around your values and keeping your values at the forefront of your mind. When you role model being “values-driven,” you set a higher standard for what it means to always come from what’s of most importance and not settle for mediocrity in face of circumstance.
2) The other most common concern sounds something like: “I already assessed my values years ago.” In such cases, I recommend that you re-assess where you are in your life and if your values have the same order of importance as they did years ago. First, you need to find your list. Then ask yourself: What values need to be added, and what values do I need to spend more time bringing to the forefront of my mind?
Here are some value assessments, which will help you define your career and personal values:
Career Values:
– Work Belief’s Inventory from Alternative Futures: http://www.alternativefutures.com/WBI_test.cfm
– Values Sort Cards from Stewart, Cooper & Coon, Inc.: http://www.stewartcoopercoon.com/jobsearch/career-values/
Personal Values:
– http://www.getsynergized.com/values.htm
Action Steps:
Take 5 minutes to answer the following questions after taking the assessment(s):
- What 3-5 values are most important to you? In other words, what values you do you want to live by as a leader in the business world?
- What values are you NOT willing to sacrifice for anything? Why? Keep this in front of you AT ALL TIMES!
- How will being “values-driven” directly affect how you are being a role model to other people?
If you have any questions, feel free to let me know.
To your career and leadership success!
Jos
Career Transition Specialist and Leadership Coach
Tags: Action, Career, Leadership, Success, Transition
