Living Your Values... Really

I'm a big fan of defining core values for organizations--and for ourselves, personally, for that matter.  I've probably blogged at least twice on the topic in the last six months.  

This afternoon, as I was editing core value definitions for a client, I recalled an article I read a few months ago in the Stanford Social Innovation Review by Mary Gentile, director of “Giving Voice to Values” and senior research scholar at Babson College.  She writes that we can give voice to our values by practicing them.  She has found in her research that most people would like to act on their values, but most are ill-prepared for that very simple reason--they just haven’t practiced them.    She outlines seven principles for anyone who would like to embody their values in the world day to day.

1. Acknowledge your values and articulate them.
2. Choose to express them… creatively, personally.
3. Recognize that you will experience value conflict.
4. Understand your purpose in your values—why you hold them, what they mean.
5. Know yourself, how you process the world; express your values consistently with who you are, not as someone else would.
6. Talk about your values; make them real without grandstanding.
7. Call out rationalizations that work against acting on them.

Pretty rational, pretty straightforward.  Worth a try.  I can guarantee that it will feel good.

Cheers,

Jim