It’s the values, whether personal, professional or collective which is the answer to this question. People’s values define, to an extent, who they are, and how they relate to the world around them and the people in it and why they do what they do. Values lead them to make the distinction between good and bad or right and wrong. These values are what they deem important and can include concepts like equality, honesty, education, effort, perseverance, loyalty, faithfulness etc. Values are very much personalized and they affect people at a deep subconscious level. Every decision people make is based on their values and either they use them as avoidance or for aspiration.
When people don’t know or lose sight of their core values, they and their professionalism fall into the trap of listlessness and ambivalence. They choose the wrong career or job perhaps under the influence of other’s values. This wrong selection later causes lack of fulfilment in that career or job, which results in poor productivity. There are also situations when the core values of an individual don’t match with the core values of the organization.
If people want to have more hope of reaching their professional height, they need to discover or restore their core values, then use these core values to drive themselves forward. Coaching for eliciting and using core values can bring people’s career to greater success. By eliciting people’s values to them and then letting them focus on their core values with laser intensity and an ever deepening knowledge and awareness of who they are and how they operate in the world, they will become more of the best of who they can be; they’ll get better results from the things they’re already doing; they’ll do new things that they never dreamed they could do; and they’ll get rid of problems that have plagued them and that they thought were unsolvable.
Values are the foundation for virtually everything that people do. Same goes with organizations as well. Without articulating a set of core values, organizations have no chance of creating a “purposeful work-culture”. There is a strong need for core values to be at the center of corporate decision making. An executive coach can help them discover/restore and then use the organizational core values to raise the motivation level among employees, discipline them, align corporate goals and objectives to core values and set strategies to effectively create the environment that realizes the full potential of the people in the organization.
Awareness and focus on values leads professionals and organizations into win-win situations. Similarly, values form a firm foundation for evaluating opportunities and problem solving situations and helping to pro-actively prevent future crises.
Following are some questions for coaches to let their clients discover or restore professional values and then use them effectively for sustainable professional achievements.
- Complete this sentence. “Your professional life is incomplete without ____________?”
- What were some of the core values that influenced you to choose your career?
- What core values does your organization/boss/colleagues have in common?
- What are the core values of your organization boss/colleagues that you extremely disagree with?
- What about your job and your colleagues; how do they interact with your values?
- What are your motivators and de-motivators at work?
Coaches should let people discover their core values, learn from them, embrace the ones that serve them, and empower them to move away from the ones that do not serve.
