The author Roy T Bennett once said; “Your values create your internal compass that can navigate how you make decisions in your life. If you compromise your values, you go nowhere.” I personally love this description and I can remember times in the past when I have made decisions but something within me “didn’t feel right.” This can often be the case for many people and could be pointing to the compass that Roy T Bennett refers to in his quotation. To help with your reflection today, as we begin this article, please think back to a time when you made a decision and something within you didn’t feel quite right. Maybe this experience could be born in mind as this article looks at our inner values.
I believe it is important to have a better understanding of our own internal values and beliefs. This understanding and how they show up within us, and how they may influence our interactions with others, could hold a key to overcoming a predicament that we might be facing. Sometimes a switch of focus to our own inner self can shine a light on something we might be wrestling with.
I remember at the beginning of my first full time coaching role. I was having lots of conversations with many stakeholders. I was being introduced to people who were looking for coaching support. I was also in the process of identifying with as many people as possible how coaching support could help them. In each coaching journey, there is always an agreement up front as to what we will work on together and how I can serve them in achieving what they wish to achieve. The support people needed was ranging from motivating others, to managing difficult relationships. As the sessions were being booked in, I was really in the flow of each day, being as present as I could possibly be with everyone I was working with, so that I could serve them in the best way possible. I was learning so much about other people in these conversations and they were learning so much about themselves. I felt in my element until I began to reflect deeper on how I was operating. As the coaching sessions were building up, so were the meetings with people enquiring. It was tiring but I was energised by the adrenaline of meeting others.
It wasn’t until I had a session with my Coach Supervisor that I realised how drained I was. The adrenaline of the work I was doing with people was keeping me going but, as I was in a space to take time to reflect, a realisation came to me. As we explored my approaches further, I came to realise that my behaviours were being driven by my values and my values weren’t always serving me in the best way possible. So, whilst I was operating with best intent, there was some learning for me.
To help you reflect on your own values:
- What are the top five most important values to you?
Some people reading this will be able to reel these off quite quickly but for many of us, we will need to really reflect and take a step back to understand which values are really important to us. I conduct many exercises with leaders and coaches to help them understand what values are important to them. It is important to do this as, according to psychological research, our values are our guiding principles that can help shape our perception of the world around us and how we respond to external events. They often guide the way we behave. Roy T Bennett certainly subscribed to this notion.
It is important, when reflecting on the question above to really understand what is vital to us. Many people will say honesty and integrity, which are two very noble values to have but, when pressed further, there may be other values that are even more important to us. For example, both these values are important to me, and they are in my top ten, but not in my top three. My top three are Helpfulness, Learning and Courage and I share these with you as these play a part in the story.
Back in my supervision session, as I was talking about the many coaching sessions I had been involved in and the many conversations with senior stakeholders, I could see that the afore mentioned values were driving my behaviours. I was throwing myself into, what I perceived at the time, difficult conversations to convince people about the need for coaching. I sensed this was being driven by Courage. Once I was in front of the people who wanted my support, my drive to help others and to learn was causing me to create busy-ness in my diary. Whilst I and the people I was working with could see the benefits that coaching was bringing, it was this realisation that I was overplaying at least one, if not all three of my top three values that struck me.
- If you think about the past month, which one of your values might be being overplayed?
Whilst I could see the benefits of these values guiding my behaviour, I needed to reign in my busy-ness. I wanted to do this to ensure that I was even more present in my discussions with everyone, and not just in a coaching setting. There would be the odd conference call or meeting where I may catch myself daydreaming and this was not my intent to either myself or the other people involved in these calls. I started to look at what other values I could draw on that could support me become even more present.
I am not a religious person, but I do have a spiritual side that believes that we are all interconnected. The best space I draw on this value is within nature or by taking time just to be present elsewhere other than in my office. This provides me with many benefits, one of which is sharper awareness of my whole self and my surroundings, which aids me when I am back in a coaching setting. I realised that that this was a value of mine that was being under-played and could be drawn on to support my practice.
- Which one of your values might be being underplayed?
So, I was now at a realisation of knowing that I was over-playing my top three values and that I needed to slow down a little by drawing on another of my top five values, but this created another internal dilemma based in part because of my value of integrity. Each of the people I was supporting had agreed with me how we would communicate, what format and how regularly. I had also booked in some sessions to support teams and groups as well. I had agreements with all these people, and this was a factor in how busy I was. I couldn’t necessarily go back and re-negotiate at this stage. So, I had an internal conflict with my own values. Inner conflicts of values are more common than we might think!
- Which of your values might be in conflict with each other?
On the one hand, I knew I had to slow down. On the other hand, I had meetings to attend. It was after much discussion with my supervisor that a very simple idea came to me that helped. In my future stakeholder meetings, I could communicate the fact that I was busy to underpin how important coaching was. I could therefore manage future expectations as demands for coaching came in. This allowed me the opportunity to block out time to become present and to ensure that I was at my resourceful best for when I was in front of people who wanted my support.
It could have been easy for me to undertake a simple time management exercise with this dilemma, but I will be forever grateful for that reflective session about values as I got a truer understanding about how I was focussing my time and why. Once I was able to understand this, I was able to make the longer-term changes that are still serving me ten years later.
Leaders and people who understand their values look at the world from a different perspective. My experience is that they understand themselves deeply and are aware of the difference of values that make up their teams. They are then able to play to people strengths according to these values. This includes themselves their own strengths as well as others. They are also able to address conflict quicker too as they understand that this might be driven by a conflict of values between one or a number of people. My belief is that this understanding of values across a team can harness trust and psychological safety, which is the foundation of any great team. Like all great teams, it begins with a deeper understanding of ourselves first:
In addition to the questions posed in todays` article, please reflect on the following questions:
- What are those decisions you are pondering that don’t feel quite right?
- What are the values of your team members and colleagues?
- How are you and the team aligned to the values of the organisation?
- How are you staying true to your values?