This ebook is all about Personal and Professional Development. It has been derived from articles published on The Organisations That Matter Learning Network from July 1st to September 30th 2009.
This ebook is the second in a series of three for 2009.
Download the ebook here
Feedback and comments are welcome.
This ebook is all about Personal and Professional Development. It has been derived from articles published on The Organisations That Matter Learning Network up until June 30th 2009.
This ebook is the first in a series of three for 2009.
Download the ebook here
Feedback and comments are welcome.
Gary Ryan defines personal values and uses examples to help illustrate what they are and how they are used. An activity is included to assist you in identifying your personal values.
This Podcast is also available for download from iTunes.
Michelle Hunt, author of Dream Makers (www.dreammakers.org) describes values as the rudder that we use to navigate our way through the turbulent waters of life. Without our values we have no rudder and simply go wherever the current takes us.
Usually our values become evident when something happens that truly upsets us. Our values are often the opposite to the things that deeply upset us. For example, if someone is telling me lies and I have discovered that I have been told lies, I have a physical reaction to that behaviour. My values of honesty and integrity have been challenged by the person lying to me which results in a strong reaction from me. Similarly, I have a strong work ethic and I struggle with people who seem lazy and then complain that nobody is helping them. In this example, my service value is being challenged.
Jerry Porras in his book Success Built to Last suggests that it doesn’t really matter what your values are (unless they would cause deliberate harm to others), what really matters is that you are aware of what they are for you. This is critically important because without a deep understanding of your values you are at risk of behaving in ways that are not congruent with them.
If you are not sure what your values are, try the following activity. You will require a pen and four small pieces of paper.
1) Write what you think might be a core value of yours on each of the four pieces of paper. You can write single words or phrases – whatever works for you. What matters is that you understand what your values mean. It doesn’t matter if no-one else understands what you write.
2) Life is challenging and sometimes we have to prioritise our values. Out of the four values that you have written down, which one would you set aside first. Please scrunch up the piece of paper with that value on it and throw it on the floor.
3) Life is even more challenging. Out of the three values that you are yet to set aside, which value would you set aside next? Once again, scrunch up the paper and drop it on the floor.
De-Brief
How did you feel when you had to select the first value to set aside? The second one? Your reactions will tell you something about whether or not what you wrote is more like a core value or not. A strong reaction to the activity more than likely indicates that what you wrote is more like a core value than not.
Now, let’s go a step further. If you have discovered some core values, do you ever behave in ways that is far worse than scrunching up a piece of paper and throwing it on the floor? Maybe you had honesty and integrity as a value, yet you regularly talk and gossip behind people’s backs, then pretend to be nice to them when they are around you.
Once we identify our core values we can use them in our day to day decision making. They help us to do the right thing at the right time. Sometimes our actions, when driven by our values are not popular. That is OK. There are times in our lives when we must take a stand no matter how futile the odds may seem to be. For example, someone may be getting bullied at work and we see it occur. What would our values guide us to do?
I recall as a young manager a service repair man who I had engaged to do a job for me provided me with a bill that seemed higher than it should have been. This contractor had done work for me before and I trusted him so I didn’t follow up on my suspicions and paid the bill (which was against our protocols!). A week after the ‘job’ was completed he returned to my office for what I thought was a friendly visit. He handed me an envelope with several hundred dollars in it. He openly told me that he had over-charged my organisation for the work that he had performed and the money in the envelope was my share of the over-payment. If I agreed to continue to contract him and to approve his work at inflated rates, he would continue to give me envelopes filled with money.
While not enraged by his behaviour I was not far from that type of reaction. I literally threw the envelope back at him and immediately told him that I was reporting him to my boss and that he would never work for our organisation again. He too reacted strongly and threatened my physical well-being at which time I picked up the phone to dial our security personnel. He quickly left our premises, never to return.
I had not gone to work that day expecting such an event to unfold. I had nothing but my values to guide me with regard to how I reacted in the moment when he handed me the money. To this day I am glad that I had the courage to follow my values. At the time I was on a very low wage and three hundred dollars was a lot of money. But there simply wasn’t a chance that I would accept it. In telling the story to my boss I also had to admit that I had not followed proper protocols when I had suspected the bill had been inflated in the first place. I was reminded of the reason why our protocols existed and promised to strictly follow them in the future, which I did.
Imagine if I was not clear about my values and I had accepted the money. Imagine the ripple effect over time. I suspect that I wouldn’t be writing this blog on this topic, that is for sure!
In another example I recently witnessed some peers provide some feedback to their colleague. While highly skilled, this person was told that she put her own success ahead of the team’s success. While difficult to hear, she thanked her peers for their honesty. She realised that what her peers had told her was true and she needed to improve in some areas, while maintaining her outstanding performance based on her technical skills. Her personal value of honesty allowed her to hear the feedback, accept it and then do something about it. Recently her peers have recognised her team first behaviours and her respect amongst her peers has sky-rocketed.
Values do conflict. They conflict on a personal level and they can conflict on an organisational level. I will write another blog about how you manage such situations. The most important issue, however, is to identify your values and to try to live them to the best of your ability. As you consciously use your values to guide your behaviour, you build your capacity to take effective action and are better able to navigate your way through the turbulent waters of life.
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Dialogue is a much used term. It seems that it is often used as a synonym for conversation. While this is in part accurate, dialogue is in fact a form of conversation that is distinct from other forms of conversation. The attachment Dialogue continuum Dialogue continuum.pdf positions dialogue at the opposite end of the conversation continuum to debate.
It is important to note that debate, polite discussion, skilful discussion and dialogue are all legitimate forms of conversation. Our perspective is that most people are highly skilled at both debate and polite discussion and poorly skilled at skilful discussion and dialogue. Debating is when each person in a conversation has a view that is un-moving and they seek to sell their view or ‘to beat down’ opposing views until their view ‘wins’. People often use their positional power to win debates which is one of the reasons why many people become very skilled at debating.
Polite discussion is when people have the appearance of agreeing with a particular view, but do not actually support the view. For a range of personal, cultural and organisational reasons people choose not to be honest. Instead, they nod their heads in agreeance or acceptance but then let others know when they are in the office kitchen that they really hold a different view. Our perspective is that polite discussion is a damaging form of conversation and should be minimised as much as possible. At least in a debate people’s positions are clear. With polite discussion, no-one other than the person themself knows their true position.
Skilful discussion is what most of us achieve when we are trying to use the skills associated with dialogue. It is a highly productive form of conversation and is the result of the generally low dialogue skills that most of us possess. Like most skills, if we haven’t practiced them very much throughout our lives we tend to be fairly poor at executing them when we first begin to use those skills. However, many of the benefits of dialogue such as learning, deeper insights, innovation, shared understanding and a deeper understanding of vision, purpose and values can be achieved through skilful discussion. In other words it is a highly desirable form of communication which demonstrates the value in practicing these skills even when we may be poor at them.
Dialogue is a form of conversation where people genuinely try to access different perspectives to enable a new understanding to emerge. Unlike debate, dialogue seeks to discover a new meaning that was not previously held by any of the participants in the dialogue. While difficult to achieve, the seven skills of dialogue can be practised at any time. Through practice, dialogue skills can significantly enhance skilful discussion and dialogue itself when the opportunity arises.
The seven skills of dialogue are deep listening, respecting others, inquiry, voicing openly, balancing advocacy and inquiry, suspending assumptions & judgements and reflecting. Each of these skills is explained below.
1. Deep listening
In its most simple form deep listening derives from the conscious choice to listen. It involves quietening the voice in our heads so that we can hear the true story of the person to whom we are listening. As we listen to understand their whole story we literally stay quiet and just listen. In exercises that we conduct on listening, people often report that they are amazed at how much they can hear when they know that all they have to do is listen. Instead of readying themself for their turn to speak, the listener focuses on understanding the speaker. Deep listening can occur anywhere, anytime. It could be with a team member while walking down a corridor. It might be with a customer in a busy department store or on the telephone. It might even be with our own partners! Imagine the difference that enhanced listening could make in that domain! The common element in all listening examples is the genuine choice to listen. It is both powerful and important if deep listening is to occur.
2. Respecting others
Voltaire, a French author, humanist, rationalist and satirist is reported to have said, “I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.” This perspective lies at the heart of respecting others. Clearly this is particularly difficult to do when we interact with people who have contrasting views to our own. Practicing this dialogue skill therefore becomes imperative if we are to develop the true capacity to dialogue. While respecting others does not mean that you have to agree with them, it does mean that you will allow them the time and space to have their say and you will see it as a perspective that while you may not understand it, it is a perspective that is valid in the context that it contributes, even if only in a small way, to our understanding of the ‘complete’ picture of whatever is our area of focus at the time.
3. Inquiry
This is the capacity to ask genuine questions. As such it encourages the use of open questions that enhance our understanding of different perspectives, or assist in the deeply held mental models that lie behind many perspectives to come to the surface. The blog The Art of Skilful Questions provides a range of insights and suggestion to assist with developing improved questioning skills.
4. Voicing openly (advocacy)
Many of us are quite talented in this skill, at least in part. Voicing openly is the capacity to say what you think and to be able to explain why you think what you think. Unfortunately many people struggle to share their view. All views, if they exist, are important for the development of a true understanding of a situation. If those views are not shared, then a part of the picture is missing which is why voicing is so important in the context of dialogue.
5. Suspending assumptions & judgements
The capacity to explain why we hold the views that we hold lies at the heart of suspending assumptions & judgements. Much like we hang our clothes on a line for them to dry, suspending means that we ‘hang out’ our reasons for our views. This allows people to look at them, question them and assist us in developing a deeper understanding of our perspectives. To suspend your assumptions & judgements illustrates a willingness to be vulnerable which is a key attribute of servant leaders (see the blogs Dee Hock – an example of a Servant Leader and The Paradoxes of Servant Leadership if you are not aware of servant leadership). Should we discover that our views are not useful through the act of having suspended them before others, we have the opportunity to adopt new ones. This experience is often described as true learning.
6. Balancing voicing (advocacy) and inquiry
This is as simple and complex as balancing sharing our view and why we have it with asking genuine questions to better understand another person’s view, or to allow the group to talk about issues that will enhance the whole group’s collective understanding of a topic. To practice this skill involves utilising all the skills listed above; deep listening, respecting others, inquiry, voicing openly and suspending assumptions & judgements. Even if the other people with whom you are conversing are not trying to dialogue, practicing this skill significantly enhances the quality of your contribution to the conversation. People will notice your enhanced communication skills because the quality of the conversations within which you participate will be enhanced by your contributions to them.
7. Reflecting
Our fast paced world offers little time to reflect. However the capacity to reflect is a big rock (see the blog The Rocks and the Jar) and enhances our communication skills and capacity to dialogue through considering how we have just practiced our skills. In team environments it is worth holding a reflection at the end of an attempted dialogue to recognise where the skills of dialogue were used effectively and where they could be improved. The blog Conducting an End of Meeting Reflection provides some pointers for such a conversation.
Summary
People often recognise that practicing dialogue is not easy. It isn’t. But the various skills of dialogue can be practised at any time in any form of communication, and providing they are used for the purpose of genuinely enhancing communication, practicing these skill will provide immense benefits for all involved and result in improved team/group performance.