Few people go about their daily business thinking about what their values are, but become painfully aware of them when someone violates one of them! Our values are at our core, the guiding principles that are our own personal blueprint for living.

There are some values that we hold that are important to us, and yet we know we don't live them fully all the time. For example, honesty is a value many of us would declare as a core value, yet most of us would have to hold our hand up to telling the occasional lie (to save face, to get out of trouble or to avoid hurting someone's feelings). These are the values that we aspire to as guiding principles in our lives, and they are important.

There will be other (often deeper seated) values that we really do live by, even if we are not particularly aware of it. For example, when a friend lets us down and we catch ourselves saying angrily ‘I'd never have done that!’ we become acutely aware of how important loyalty is as a value.

Some values are quite shocking to realise and own up to. For example, in the wake of a particularly terrible terrorist atrocity one senior manager was adamant that revenge was the obvious course of action. When their coach explored this further and asked how this belief might be played out at work, the senior manager thought for a while and said (somewhat reluctantly) you know, you’re right. If I think someone has stitched me up at work, I bide my time, but eventually, I make sure they suffer somehow.

Becoming aware that, in this case, revenge is a value that actually guides behaviour, is extremely useful. First it releases any energy that has been spent denying this aspect of ourselves, essentially we have greater integrity (literally we are more integrated when we own more aspects of our true selves). Second, once we are aware, we have a choice. We can’t change anything that we don t know about, and whilst revenge might always be a value, we can choose whether or not to act on it when we are aware of it.

From the list below, identify the 10 values that you think are the most important to you.

Think in terms of the values that guide your behaviour, the ones you know that you live by (most of the time) as well as the ones you aspire to.

Now eliminate 5, seeing if you can identify and keep the ones you really do live by much of the time.

Possible Values

Reflecting on your values:

Think about 3 occasions in your career, however brief, when you felt really great, rewarded, fulfilled. Don’t forget, it is not the achievement that is the value, it is the hidden need that is being fulfilled. List all the words which keep cropping up and see which ones are common across those golden moments. They are likely to be important values.

Now do the same thing for occasions when events were causing distress or anger. What was present/or absent then? Taking all examples, in what way do they align or clash with your list of values?

Further questions to reflect upon:

What do your values mean in practice? What would we see you doing that would tell us that these were your values?
What would others think your values are? How would they have come to think this?
What are the tensions between your values and what you think may be expected of you?
What happens when someone transgresses your core values? How would they do this? How would you feel and react?
What happens when your values are being challenged?
What do you do when you are in a position where your values are being compromised, e.g. if you are asked or expected to do something that goes against the grain ?
What happens when you are torn between two important values, e.g. whatever action you take means that one or another value is compromised?
What is the cost to you of compromise?

An Exercise for Planning your Future Career

Possible Values