I can point to dozens of powerful lessons I learned in the decade and a half I had direct involvement in behavior-based safety. While the initiative was focused on identifying and decreasing the risks the workforce was exposed to, it provided a hands-on look at why people do what they do. I’d put th...
As an organization, Enron had indeed identified their values:
Respect: We treat others as we would like to be treated ourselves. We do not tolerate abusive or disrespectful treatment. Ruthlessness, callousness and arrogance don't belong here.
Integrity: We work with customers and prospects openl...
In early December of 2001, I was just getting my feet under me in the behavior-based safety role I had accepted in the spring of that year, doing all I could to take care of our young family, and still reeling a bit from our freedom being attacked just a few months prior. I remember seeing the headl...
Before we dig into the challenges that come with “core values so generic that they could easily serve as fodder for a Dilbert cartoon,” and we’ll work through that in specific detail soon enough, we need to think about how that could ever be the case when “more than three-quarters of CEOs interviewe...
In my experience over the last two decades, I can’t point to a single company that I’ve worked for or with where no values were listed anywhere; in the employee handbook at a minimum, but often painted on the walls in prominent areas throughout the facility as well. With much of my experience with t...
A recent Harvard Business Review article shared that although 95% of people think they are self-aware, only 10-15 % of people are truly self aware.
Self-awareness has two components: internal and external. Internal self-awareness involves understanding one's values, personality traits, strengths, a...
The interaction we’ve had with Craig, Kim, and their team over the years since they bought their business has given us a ton of clarity for the critical role values can play in a business. That experience has also helped us develop a clearer picture of who we can best serve through the work we’re do...
Over the course of my close to fifty years on this ball of mud, I’ve learned that the only people who truly like change are the ones who came up with the idea for the specific change that’s happening in any given moment. I can tolerate change when I have some level of control in how it occurs or whe...
As we developed more clarity around the values of the clients we enjoyed working with the most, we found more and more opportunities to challenge them on how to tie those values to nearly every conversation they had with their teams. This didn’t require major changes in what they were already doing;...
As Cindy and I worked to learn and understand what each member of our Executive Leadership Elite Think Tank had as core values for their organizations, we had intense conversations with all of them regarding how they kept those values in front of their teams; how often and in what setting did they c...
Throughout our professional lives, Cindy and I had seen a wide range of values defined by the organizations we were part of. A few either had no clearly defined values to speak of or they just never referenced them. Others had a couple of values listed in a policy manual or on a bulletin board but d...
One area where most leaders need to increase their self-awareness is in their own development, which is just as important as their team's! If we are truly growing, we will identify areas where we can improve. When we create change within ourselves (growth) and become better in these areas, and conti...
