How to Identify Your Team’s Values (it’s not what you think)
The best way to understand someone's values is to look at their actions. So, if you want to better understand your values as a leader, take a look at your actions. The same goes for your team.
Leaders, if you're planning to do a values exercise with your team, you'll get the most accurate answer to the question "what are our values?" not by making a lofty list of what the team might we would value in a utopian workplace, but by looking at actual recent team behavior. Consider the following to suss out what is being valued by your team.
Which work projects get prioritized?
Which meeting topics are almost guaranteed, and which topics never happen but should?
What appreciations are articulated or not?
When meetings are thrown on people's calendars at the last minute, the values might be flexibility and responsiveness.
When your team regularly debriefs miscommunications, it values transparency and alignment.
When your team holds each other accountable it values integrity - honoring one’s word.
I worked with a team where the leader really wanted their people to own the problems of the business. Based on what was stated, this leader clearly valued building ownership in their team. However, looking at this leader's actions instead of professed values, they didn't solicit their team's ideas about solving business problems. They didn't allow for autonomy in decision-making even to the highest-level leaders. They kept the final say for themselves, often criticizing ideas and blocking collaboration.
So look out also for what's being valued that you might not want to see on paper:
Do you value your own opinion more than that of the leaders on your team?
Do you value expediency at the expense of thoughtful, strategic decision-making?
By not wanting to "overburden" your team with too much information, are you actually seeing value in keeping people in the dark? (If people aren’t privy to certain things then they can’t interfere with them).
Do you value keeping the peace so much so that important feedback never gets shared?
All of the above would indicate that the leader may be devaluing the ownership that comes with collaborative decision-making.
What gets your attention is an important indicator of what matters most to you. These are values.
Notice what gets your attention. What topics get put on the table? Which topics get tabled? Look at your team’s actions and you’ll see its values. Based on that assessment, what values might be missing? Which might need some amplification? Which would you like to acknowledge?
