Why Values and a Personal Mission Matter

Your Guide to Making Life Choices That Count

Welcome to the first issue of ValuesCrafting. We're happy to have you join our community of individuals passionate about living their values.

Do you ever feel like there's a gap between your core values and your daily actions? We've all been there. That's why we created this newsletter.  We'll share practical strategies to help you bridge that gap and empower yourself to live a more fulfilling life, aligned with what truly matters to you. 

In this first issue, you'll discover:

A powerful framework for defining your goals and personal mission. Uncover your "why" and gain clarity on the direction you want to take.

A comprehensive look into the meaning and nature of core values. Learn how to identify your most important values and understand their impact on your life.

We've also curated some of the best online resources on values to save you time and effort in your search. As a bonus, especially for people in positions that influence the actions of other people, we'll share the story behind ValuesCrafting and our own journey with values-based living, writing, and consulting.

We truly appreciate your interest. 

Warmly, Susan

The daily grind at work and home can feel like a treadmill of tasks and obligations. You wake up, tend to your family, drive to work or step down the hall to your office, check your email, navigate meetings, and chase deadlines. But amidst all of this hustle, have you ever stopped to ask yourself: What truly matters to you? What are your most deeply held values and personal mission?

Knowing your core values and personal mission is more than a self-help cliche. They are the invisible compass that will guide your big and small decisions. It's the difference between feeling adrift and empowered, sleepwalking through your days, and actively shaping a meaningful life based on your values and personal mission.

You Need to Identify Your Values and Personal Mission

Understanding your most deeply held values and personal mission forms the foundation for a fulfilling life. They provide a cornerstone for guidance and making choices, acting as the invisible hand that steers you in the right direction.

Your values become the invisible hand guiding your choices, big and small. They help you navigate your career path, select fulfilling hobbies, and cultivate meaningful relationships. From how you interact with colleagues to your approach to family and friends, your values shape your interactions with the world around you.

Are you curious how your values influence your life? Let's dive deeper into what values are and explore some common examples to help you identify your own.

What Are Values?

Values are traits or qualities that are considered worthwhile; they represent your highest priorities and deeply held driving forces and beliefs. When you are part of any organization, you bring your deeply held values and personal mission to the organization.

There, they co-mingle with those of the other company members to create an organization or family culture. This culture either effectively serves your goals or does not. (If not, you may want to consider changing your culture so it supports the accomplishment of your full organizational potential.)

Value Statements

Value statements are derived from and grounded in values. They define how people want to behave with each other in an organization, an institution, a company, or a family. They are statements about how the organization will value customers, suppliers, and the internal community.

Value statements describe actions that are the living enactment of the fundamental values held by most individuals within the organization. In one organization, a university health care center, all employees helped identify the organization's core values.

Example of Value Statements

They ended up with the acronym I CARE. The values identified were integrity, compassion, accountability, respect, and excellence. Then, each department took each of the values and developed value statements that the employees believed best exemplified the values in action in their department.

An example of a value statement was, "We will keep no student who needs care waiting for more than fifteen minutes." Another was, "No student will need to remove clothing items until they were seen by a doctor and the removal was deemed necessary for a proper examination."

Examples of Values

These are examples of values; many more exist that are specific to each person. You might use these as the starting point for thinking about and articulating your own values as a human being.

ambition, competency, individuality, equality, integrity, service, responsibility, accuracy, respect, dedication, diversity, improvement, enjoyment/fun, loyalty, credibility, honesty, innovativeness, teamwork, excellence, accountability, empowerment, quality, efficiency, dignity, collaboration, stewardship, empathy, accomplishment, courage, wisdom, independence, security, challenge, influence, learning, compassion, friendliness, discipline/order, generosity, persistence, optimism, dependability, flexibility, change

Why Establish Your Values and Personal Mission?

Your values comprise everything that has happened to you in your life. They​include influences from your parents and family, your religious affiliation, your friends and peers, your education, your reading, your experiences, and more.

Effective people recognize these environmental influences and identify and develop a clear, concise, and meaningful set of values and priorities. Once defined, values impact every aspect of life and form the foundation for decision-making and relationships with other humans.

You demonstrate and model your values in action in your personal and work behaviors, decision making, contribution, and interpersonal interaction.

• You use your values to decide priorities in your daily work and home life.

• Your goals and life purpose are grounded in your values

Choose the values that are most important to you, the values you believe in, and that define your character. You will want to adopt them, commit to them, and then live them visibly every day of your life at work and home.

Living your values is one of the most powerful tools you can use to help you become the person you want to be, accomplish your goals and dreams, and lead and influence others.

A value-based and principled person can create a successful and fulfilling career and life. Don't waste your best opportunity.

Did you find this article helpful? Why not share it with interested colleagues and friends?

What Exactly Are Core Values?

They Are Your Most Deeply Held Beliefs

Core values are traits, integrities, or qualities that are not just worthwhile. They represent an individual or an organization’s highest priorities, deeply held beliefs, and core, fundamental driving forces.

Values comprise the heart of what your organization and its employees stand for worldwide. They demonstrate your own intrinsic worth and beliefs.

Values are also intrinsic to the vision of your organization that you present to customers and stakeholders. Internally, your values are the manifestation of your soul that your employees experience.

Your core values are fundamental to attracting and retaining the best, most contributing employees. Your values demonstrate how you value your employees every day.

Core values are also known as guiding principles because they form a solid core of who you are, what you believe, and who you are and want to be going forward.

Core Values Define What Your Organization Demonstrates

Your values describe how you want your organization to resonate with and appeal to employees and the external world. The core values should be integrated with your employees' belief systems and actions so that clients, customers, and other shareholders see your values in action.

For example, successful companies' hearts and core values are evident in how they serve customers and value employees.

• When customers tell the company they feel cherished by the business, you know your employees live your core value of extraordinary customer care and service.

• You demonstrate the value of partnership when customer feedback guides decisions about your product offerings.

• When employees express gratitude for your care and thoughtfulness when they experience tragedy and times of sorrow, you are demonstrating your values of empathy, compassion, and appreciation.

Core Values Form the Foundation of Your Organization

Values form the foundation for everything that happens in your workplace. The core values of the employees in your workplace, along with their experiences, upbringing, and so on, meld together to form your corporate culture.

The core values of the founder of an organization permeate the workplace. Their core values are powerful shapers of the organization’s culture.

The core values of your senior leaders are also important in developing your culture. The reason? These senior leaders have great power in your organization to set the direction and define daily actions.

Senior Leaders and Managers Define the Employee Experience

The senior leaders and the managers who report to them set the tone for establishing the quality of the work environment for people.

The quality of the work environment employees experience reflects the core values of all employees, but the values of your senior leaders who walk their talk are overreaching.

To incorporate and reinforce their values, your leaders and managers have selected employees who they believe have congruent values and fit your workplace culture. They hope that the employee experience of being valued will enhance the desired culture.

Closer to Home

Parents or partners also shape the culture experienced by family members in the home. Your values exhibited in words, actions, and expectations define the experience of family members. They help shape the world experience and, hopefully, help the next generation express values congruent with yours.

Conclusion

You cannot overemphasize the power of core values at work or home. They are beacons guiding your everyday actions in your workplace and life. They form the foundation for everything else: decisions, actions, relationships, and the environment in which you live.

ValuesCrafting Compass: Curated Resources for Value-Driven People

• As promised in the introduction, this is the backstory behind ValuesCrafting and our own journey with values-based living, writing, and consulting, especially for people in positions that influence the actions and performance of other people.

• You will enjoy taking this quiz, the Personal Values Assessment | Discover Your Values, which helps you identify your core values. The number of core values you select will govern the amount of time you invest in the instrument. After choosing twenty-some values, the test took about 15 minutes. You will also want to explore the AI-assisted descriptions available at the end. They’re fun and informative.

• Identifying values in an organization is a waste of time unless the senior team is committed to implementing the values in the workplace daily. Patrick M. Lencioni, who wrote The Five Dysfunctions of a Team, Death by Meeting, and The 6 Types of Working Genius, among others, recommends three commitments that must be present for a foundational set of core values. He says you need to be aggressively authentic and weave the values into every process that touches employees. This is a must-read if you are considering adopting values in your organization or team. (Unlocked at Harvard Business Review.)

• 12 Deeply Held Beliefs form the foundation for the recommendations in ValuesCrafting (on this site) and at SusanHeathfield.com,

• Warren Buffet Says 3 Choices in Life Separate Those Who Achieve From Those Who Dream. He advises that you choose people who demonstrate integrity at Inc.com.

• You will find Wise Advice About Being Your Authentic Self at inspiringquotes.com. Enjoy the quotes when you need an uplifting thought.