A Job Done Well - Making Work Better

Understand What You Value and Be Happy and Successful at Work

• James Lawther, Jimmy Barber, Rachael Edmundson-Clarke • Season 2 • Episode 34

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In this episode, hosts James Lawther and Jimmy Barber are joined by Rachael Edmondson-Clarke to dive into the importance of understanding and aligning personal and organisational values to boost performance and enjoyment at work.

Rachael explains how clarifying personal values can significantly impact your happiness and satisfaction, leading to a more fulfilling career and life. She guides James and Jimmy through a values elicitation exercise, demonstrating how to identify and align those values with actions and decisions. 

They also discuss the dangers of organisations claiming they value something when they don't.

You'll also be treated to improbable films and unfulfilled cowboy dreams!

Got a question - get in touch. Click here.

Speaker 5:

Hello, I'm James. Hi, I'm Jimmy and welcome to a Job Done Well, the podcast that helps you improve your performance enjoyment at work.

James:

Good afternoon. How you doing?

Jimmy:

I'm right. James, how are you?

James:

I'm doing very well. Thank you very much. Um, I got film pick for you. out

Jimmy:

film pick.

James:

pick. I went out last night and I saw,

Jimmy:

What? What? What art house movie are you now gonna tell us about?

James:

hundreds of beavers. Have you heard of hundreds of beavers?

Jimmy:

Avoiding all the obvious jokes. No.

James:

It's fantastic. it's a, it's like a cult film. It was released a couple of years ago, but it's very funny. But I went to this thing and it was a special showing I didn't realize, and there are people who've seen this film 10, 12 times, but very funny. You need to go and see hundreds. my um, that's my recommendation for you.

Jimmy:

Okay. I'm not entirely convinced. That is something that I'm gonna see. In fact, I'm not entirely convinced it's a real thing and you just haven't made it up for your own amusement. But well, you can ask me what I've been up to, James things. You didn't, you didn't even wait for me to question you. You didn't even wait for the, what? You've been up to James and you just went straight into your hundreds of beat.

James:

me, what have you been up to, Jimmy? Better be a good

Jimmy:

Well,

James:

Better be

Jimmy:

I ha I actually, I have got a good recommendation for you, not for you, but for the rest of the world. A great box set. Yellow Yellowstone It's about Montana and Cowboys and a ranch in America, and it's absolutely incredible. Kevin Costner is the the lead character. But anyhow, every time I watch it, I want to be a cowboy when I grow up. And then I examine it and there's absolutely, yeah. Yeah. But this is, this is proper old school western cowboys, 10 gallon hats, everything. And, and, but there's no aspect of that life I can do, there's nothing I'm, I have no talent, but you kind of wanna do it. So I might do a Yellowstone experience one day.

James:

There wasn't much call for horses in North London. Then when you were

Jimmy:

Not, not a lot. Not a lot. And one other thing I was going to mention, James, just as a complete aside we are active on lots of channels now. And so if you are listening to this this podcast and you've got off, I don't know apple or Spotify or whatever, we also have a YouTube channel and we are on TikTok. So check us out on those channels as well.

James:

We got our TikTok review. What did they call us?

Jimmy:

They called us Stone Cold Losers. It wasn't a review, James. You are so old skool somebody put a comment on something that we did. It was a comment. Stone cold losers.

James:

The guys are stone cold losers anyway. It shows

Jimmy:

that on TikTok, they're quite incisive in fairness.

James:

Right. Anyway, today. Today we have a guest. We have Rachel Edmondson Clark back with us. Hello Rachel. How are you doing? I.

Rachael:

I'm doing really well, and I have to say I've been a cowgirl and I would totally

Jimmy:

Have you?

Rachael:

yes, yes, yes, yes. I went

Jimmy:

How?

Rachael:

live on a ranch with a family in Idaho. This was

Jimmy:

Really?

Rachael:

back, a few years now, but they had this, this, this amazing ranch that was out in the middle of absolutely

Jimmy:

Yeah.

Rachael:

no electricity, and, you know, it was just, it, it, it was gas. It was an outdoor shower

Jimmy:

Yeah.

Rachael:

we did a lot of pushing of cows and wild horses actually camping out around Yellowstone National Park. And it's just absolutely gorgeous

Jimmy:

Today, we are talking about values and the reason for exploring this with Rachel is she brings some fantastic expertise and when your values are aligned it can lead to, you know, a real improvement in, your performance and your enjoyment at work, which is what this podcast's all about. And when it's misaligned, it can do the complete opposite. So we thought we'd get Rachel along to share her thoughts about values. What are they how do you work out your values? What do you do with that? And what do you do when it, they're, they're not aligned. So, Rachel, welcome.

Rachael:

Thank you so much for having me back. It's good to be with you both again.

Jimmy:

So values what do you mean by values?

Rachael:

Hmm. Well that's a brilliant place to start. So values are just a generalization of experiences that are deeply important to us. And so their nature is that they can actually be quite vague. And I don't know let me ask you both. Have you, have you ever done any kind of value elicitation before?

Jimmy:

Not personal values, I guess. I've done some stuff around organizational values, but not necessarily my own personal values.

Rachael:

Okay.

James:

well, I actually, um, I did something, I was working for a bank for a while and we did a big session on values and then they actually took the time to say, well, if that's what's important to you, how does that line up with the organization? was, um, quite an interesting thing.

Rachael:

Very interesting. Very interesting. And out of interest, did your values align with the organizations?

James:

yeah. Mine went too bad. What was interesting was after we did the session, a large number of people left the organization, so they obviously came to the conclusion it wasn't the right place Um, And the organization did that on which I think that's

Jimmy:

cause if you are not lined up with the company's values and mission and goals and all the rest of it, you're better off being somewhere else and they can get somebody who is aligned.'cause they know that will improve their performance.

James:

Better for you and

Jimmy:

Yeah. Yeah.

James:

agree.

Rachael:

interesting. I was working with an organization just just a few weeks ago and I was working with their senior leadership team and we had a very open and honest conversation'cause I wanted to bring values into it. There is a, there is a risk that you might find that you elicit people's personal values and they don't align with the organization. And actually, are you. Are you willing to, to go there and to have that discussion.. But they, their personal values were very aligned to the organizational values.

Jimmy:

So, right, Just help me understand though, when you, when we are talking about values, can you give me, and, you know, some examples of what values are and then how do they differ from, I don't know, behaviors or, goals or, strategies or whatever it is that companies have?

Rachael:

Yeah. It's a really good question. And and I suppose if values are like our guiding principles, they're generalizations about experiences that are important to us. behaviors are the observable actions. So they will reflect very often the values and also the qualities in practice. So there's lots of examples of values. Some very high level values might be things like peace and love and joy and kindness, compassion, freedom, responsibility. you know, there's lots and lots of them. Whereas the behaviors might be more like things like, you know, speaking up in meetings or apologizing after you've made a mistake or offering to help, which could be linked to the kindness value is so I, I, you know, I, I, I trust that that maybe helps make things a little bit clearer, but one of the things we can absolutely share with listeners is I've got some definitions and examples that we can make available to everybody afterwards as well, so we can, we've got a handout that we can, we can share with that.

Jimmy:

Have we.

James:

well, Sorry, just so we know, we'll put that on the show notes. It's only been once set. That's where it

Jimmy:

And, and have we got any examples of, we are talking about individual values as well as company values, so have you got any examples of companies that have a very clear set of values? Yeah,

James:

let me, I think there are some, there are some in there are companies which state values and follow through on them. And there are others which state values. And it's just all so much flipping hot air. So, um, just to go with the hot air ones, those are the ones, um, that always appeal to me. Uh, Yeah, so Enron, you remember the Enron scandal yeah. Yeah. One of their stated values was Integrity, which I,

Jimmy:

Just for the listeners who, don't know who Enron were, they were, a large American energy company who basically cooked the books?

James:

Yeah, exactly that. Yeah. And they, it was a major, it was a billion dollar scandal. They went bust spectacularly, And then the other one, oh, the other one that I really like is, Facebook. So one of Facebook's stated values is to be open. Presumably they mean be open with our data, which they're sharing with a load of people they shouldn't be sharing But, um, so it's just, I think it's, I think they're really important if you up on them now. Uh, It so happens that Rachel and I

Jimmy:

Right.

James:

the same We used to work for Mars and they have five values that they used to talk about, they were quality, responsibility, mutuality, freedom. the other one, bear with me, efficiency, that was it.

Jimmy:

James. James. So the fi out, the five, the one that you, Mr. Efficiency forgets is efficiency. Oh, that's, that's, I'm embarrassed for you, James again.

James:

the thing about that organization was they really lived them. Yes. They talk about mutuality and that was about always finding the win-win and it was just endemic within the organization. up.

Rachael:

about how they're lived and it's about how teams and individuals interpret those values because they are generalizations. So what's the criteria that means that we are meeting that value be

James:

Yeah.

Rachael:

might be different for different people. And what are the qualities that we want to portray or that we want our team or our leaders to portray to you know, so such that the behaviors that you then see throughout the culture. Are connected back to those, back to those values.

Jimmy:

so Rachel, tell me why is it important to understand your values and what impact does that have?

Rachael:

When we've got clarity of our values, it kind of takes the guesswork outta life. So there are guiding principles. They're the things that are helping us to shape our priorities and our decisions. And very often I think if we are not clear on these and if we haven't done the exercise to properly reflect and think about what's most important to us, we end up drifting or at worse living by what other people think is most important for us. So think of Valley as almost like your North Star, and when you live in alignment with those things, feel good.

Jimmy:

I think there's, there's also a point for me on that is, it's ensuring you really do get to your values and, and rather than, what your company's values are or what you think your values should be, it's really getting into the, this is truly the things that drive me.'cause otherwise you end up, figuring out your North Star, which actually isn't you a North star,

Rachael:

Yeah,

Jimmy:

but inside, inside you're still gonna have the, the values that you haven't articulated, you've just articulated in the wrong way. So there is a risk there.

James:

And I guess as well, this just, helping you if you are not, feel uncomfortable with things and being able to why you feel uncomfortable is a very, very useful thing. So an example of that will be, and this will come as a bit surprise to some said, I worked for a bank for a while and that bank was deeply, deeply analytical. about numbers above all else. And I never really felt that it was the place for me, which surprising.

Jimmy:

Yeah.

James:

analysts, I mean the way

Jimmy:

Yeah, it should be home, home, home ground for you.

James:

absolutely. But for me, what they were missing, because it's important to me was they didn't look at it. or I felt it wasn't very systematic and I didn't, um, pay attention to people. It's much more about numbers than people. whether I'm right or wrong or whether the bank was right or wrong is a bit of an irrelevance. The point is never quite jelled for me. And being able to express why it never jelled to would've, um, helped me, sort my life out

Jimmy:

What is it that's not quite right it is, it does often come back to values.

Speaker 6:

The show you're listening to right now. Brings you insights to help you improve performance and enjoyment of work. It takes a long time to produce, but we think it's well worth it. It's all in the name of helping you get your job done. Well, all we ask in return is that you share the link to the show with someone that you think would benefit from it. And if you haven't already, click on Follow the Show wherever you're listening to this podcast right now. Anyway, let's get back to the show.

Jimmy:

When, I was thinking about this as well, Rachel, I think there was you know, it is getting to the core of what, what really are your values? And because I think to, to James's point, there's a, a big thing around alignment and alignment between words and actions. But in, in, in order to work out the words, how do you go about thinking about what, what are your values?

Rachael:

Well, would you like to give this a go? Shall we have, shall we do this?

Jimmy:

Yeah. Yeah. We can, we can give it a try.

Rachael:

So James did, I know you said you've done this, but you've done it quite a while ago. It sounded,

James:

Yeah, I did it a while, but yeah, I.

Rachael:

So I think the other thing that I would say to people is even if they have done a values elicitation exercise, how recently is it that they have revisited that? Because of course, as life changes, our values do change. And I, I would recommend checking in on this every, you know, at least three to six months James, it sounds like it's been more than three months ago

James:

I'm 20 years. I think we'll give it that. Yeah, A

Jimmy:

he can't. Yeah, and he can't remember what he had for breakfast, so he is not gonna remember what he said 20 years ago.

Rachael:

So let's give this a go and then anyone listening can also answer these questions for themselves as I,

Jimmy:

Okay.

Rachael:

these questions. Then, then let's, let's do this. Okay. So the first question that I have is, do you mind if I ask you a question before you answer me though? answer to this question must be if it's a very personal question, Rachel. So Jimmy and James, do you mind if I ask you a question?

Jimmy:

Only, it's a very personal question, Rachel

Rachael:

How are we gonna have some fun doing this? Brilliant.

James:

you think

Jimmy:

looks, he the.

James:

I think one of the, one of your values is a little bit more bubbly than mine, Rachel, but go on.

Rachael:

Oh, brilliant. Okay. I love it. So can you think of something in the context of work or business that you would like to improve upon? You know, so this might be, it might be capability related, it could be communication related, it could be something to do with time or personal development or finance. I just wanna know, can you think of something that in the context of work, business, career, whatever you would describe it as would like to improve upon.

Jimmy:

Yeah.

Rachael:

Jimmy, do you wanna kick us off? So what's the thing that you would like to improve upon?

Jimmy:

I would like to improve on sharing the experience and knowledge that we have with more people.

Rachael:

Yeah. Sharing the experience and knowledge more people. Okay. What will that do for you?

Jimmy:

That would make me feel positive about the impact that I was having on other people's lives.

Rachael:

Okay. And so just'cause I'm just,'cause I'm curious what is it that's important about So what does having or feeling positive about that impact, what does that allow you to experience?

Jimmy:

I get a sense of achievement and fulfillment in seeing others do something really well.

Rachael:

We're gonna pause there with Jimmy for a second. I'm gonna come over.

Jimmy:

I, I was gonna go for, make more money, I should have gone for make more money.

Rachael:

Well, in which case. In which case that's, that's fine. And I would've asked you, what will having the money do for you?

Jimmy:

Yeah. It, I, I think making money for me does two things. One, it gives you a sense of freedom of choice. And it also is a proxy measure for success

Rachael:

Okay, great. Okay. And when you say freedom, freedom to have what? To do,

Jimmy:

to, do the things that you want to do. If I had limitless money, I could go and experience being a cowboy in Yellowstone for a bit. At the moment, I can't do that.

Rachael:

Highly recommend it. I'm sure I'm, I'm sure they'd take helpers on.

Jimmy:

In order to help, you'd have to have some ability to help. I don't think I could add any value. I can't ride, I can't write, I can't write, I can't rope. I don't like animals. Like I, I wouldn't go near cows and horses and, or that sort of stuff. I could probably sh, I could probably shovel shit. That's about all I could do. Sorry, Rachel. We, we, we, we digressed slightly.

Rachael:

Oh, okay. So bringing us back. So this is freedom to do the things that you want to,

Jimmy:

Yeah.

Rachael:

like going and being a cowboy in a Yellowstone. what's important to you about that? What does being a cowboy in Yellowstone, having the freedom to go and do things like that, what does that allow you to experience?

Jimmy:

I think it, it allows you to experience different things in life and it you can experience variety, you can try new things. It's the feeling if you like, of empowerment to choose your course and your way of living.

Rachael:

Hmm. Beautiful. Okay. So for those of you who have been listening in intently, we've had a number of values that we've elicited from Jimmy through that. So impact, achievement, fulfillment, freedom, variety, empowerment, success. Were just a few of them. So Jimmy, thank you so much. You've given us lots to

Jimmy:

Wow. You took, you took more, make more money and made it sound very much more virtuous.

Rachael:

Well, when it, when it comes to things like money or freedom, it is about us drilling, drilling down and understanding a little bit more. You know, what is that about? So when

Jimmy:

Yeah.

Rachael:

freedom is a very big, broad value. So being able to ask that question. So if that's come up for any of the listeners being able to ask that question, to have, freedom to do, freedom, to be what? Exactly. And what is

Jimmy:

Yeah,

Rachael:

that that's important to you? Okay.

Jimmy:

I wanna see what you do with James now.

Rachael:

James, I come to next.

James:

Okay. Well, mine's interesting because it starts in the same place, but I don't think it ends in the same place. You see what I mean? Different journey. Yeah. So my, um, the thing I wrote down is, the thing I would like to do is I would like to market this podcast better so that it is more, widely listened to. And why would I like to do that? I think that it would be great if organizations ran'cause I think most organizations aren't run terribly well, so they could be an awful lot slicker. Um, I think if they ran better, people would also enjoy their jobs a lot more because I think that's an important part of it. Um, And then, you know, that is all about, economic growth and people being happier and all of those things are the things which trip outta that. But for me, it really is about things working the way that they should do.

Rachael:

Okay. What will, having that outcome of being able to make this impact what will having that do for you?

James:

For me I think there's in seeing a job done well. Wow. Look at That

Jimmy:

The tall, that was slick.

James:

was slick. Yeah. Yeah. uh, Satisfaction in that. I think, I mean, for me personally, I think it gives it would give me the opportunity to go and more things and talk to more people and understand how people spend their lives, which I find quite fascinating. So that I think for me would be my personal, aim in that because I'm always fascinated by the way things work and seeing that would be good.

Rachael:

What's important about that?

James:

it's intellectual curiosity really. I've always found it fascinating I've gone from one company to another or one organization to another, and just understanding, well, what do they do? How do things work? And that for me, I just get a buzz outta that. It's just that, it's almost like the little kid who takes a clock apart. It's just understanding for me is yeah. Again, great satisfaction outta that.

Rachael:

Okay, so we're back to satisfaction. I get it. Okay. Brilliant. Super stuff. So satisfaction again is one of these values that's really quite it's quite broad. So let's look at how we might chunk that down into some qualities. So what creates satisfaction for you James? So like, let's maybe think of the last time when you felt really deeply satisfied about something, was happening?

James:

think two uh, two things would occur to me. is, uh, I published a book and I felt deeply satisfied about that. uh, element of creation. I did that satisfaction,

Jimmy:

Managed by morons. For those you who haven't read it yet.

James:

good book. So says, um, and then the other thing I think is just learning new things. I always find that deeply satisfying.

Rachael:

Beautiful. Thank you so much. And so what we've done there is we've elicited, we've listed three, at least three values there. So satisfaction creation or creativity and learning.

James:

Yeah.

Jimmy:

you go.

Rachael:

Well done.

Jimmy:

So you've helped us, Rachel, understand our personal values. what do we do with that now? So I've, I've understood, a few things that are important to me. Now what do I do?

Rachael:

And bear in mind, we're obviously doing this in a very light touch way

Jimmy:

Yeah, yeah.

Rachael:

But what I would do next is I would look to sort these into some sorts of hierarchy so that we can understand what's most important. So so Jimmy, if we come back to you,

Jimmy:

Yes.

Rachael:

so the values that we identified in no particular order, impact, achievement, fulfillment, freedom, which you broke down into variety and empowerment and also success. Does that so, so does that sort of feel congruent to you? Do you feel as though there's anything particularly that's missing?

Jimmy:

I think there are other things that are important to me around how relationships work and how people treat each other and stuff like that. I value working with people. I value trust, I value, how we care for each other.

Rachael:

Perfect. Okay. So just one thing I'm gonna note on trust that you brought up. So,'cause this can come up quite a lot for people around trust and respect. So sometimes people say, actually

Jimmy:

Yeah.

Rachael:

is really important to me. And I think one of the things that to en to enable us to make sure we're setting you up for success is just to remember that you can't control others' trust or respect of you. So you can

Jimmy:

Yeah.

Rachael:

trusting and you can be a trusting person. Yeah. So it is just one to watch out for and just to be aware of because if this is something that you value, that others are trust, you know that they trust you, you can't control that. And so that would be not setting you up for success. This is the process. so Jimmy, what I'm doing with you, I want your listeners to do as well, and it's

Jimmy:

yeah.

Rachael:

this process. So you've got your values that you've now elicited and you've talked about impact, achievement, fulfillment, freedom, encompass variety and empowerment for you and success. Now I'm gonna let you choose one, one of those. You can only have one. Which one would you choose?

Jimmy:

Well, my first one, I would choose impact.

Rachael:

Okay.

Jimmy:

be my number one thing.

Rachael:

and because I'm, because I'm being really kind and really nice today. I'll let you have another one. So what would be your second one?

Jimmy:

My second one would be achievement.

Rachael:

Okay. So let me just check. You have more impact and less achievement. Is that okay?

Jimmy:

Yeah. Yeah, so, Rachel, does that mean the, the process we're following is to, it's not just prioritizing, it's not just saying my priority order is one through five. It's the way you are driving me to think about it as in, you know, what's my number one and I can only have one?

Rachael:

have more impact

Jimmy:

Yeah.

Rachael:

achievement. Is that okay? Because sometimes people say, no, it's not okay. Right. So

Jimmy:

it. Yeah, you can switch the order. So it is just picking them one at a time and then comparing them to the previous

Rachael:

Correct.

Jimmy:

just checking that you're happy with that order. So then you end up with a,, a kind of relative ranking of of them

Rachael:

absolutely, yes. That's it. And you work through them in that way?

Jimmy:

and, and then when you've got a priority order

Rachael:

Mm-hmm.

Jimmy:

Once you've got that, what do you then do with your values?

Rachael:

So I would then get really, really clear on, on the criteria. So what's the criteria that allows you, that enables you to experience that value? So what has to be, true? how do you know that that value has been met? What will you see? What will you hear? What will you feel? How would somebody else know that that value is being met as well? you know, so what is it that has to be true for you to feel that sense of impact or achievement or freedom, for

James:

So as a for instance, Jimmy will know he has achieved that level of impact when we have 10 times the number of business or or whatever the hell it might be. But it's about being really specific about what the outcome is that will make you feel that you have got your value has been met.

Rachael:

it's about it. It's about what you're gonna see, what you're going to hear, what you're gonna feel. And it's about how would somebody else know that that value has been met. example, I was working with you know, with a client the other day and they were talking just about actually how loved and connected they felt. And I was like, so, and how did your wife, and how did your children, like, how did they know that that value was being met? Well, I was present, I was playful. I was, Joyful. And you then start to understand some of the qualities that you are wanting to bring to help you then experience more of that thing that you value so much.

Jimmy:

So it is really being a bit more specific and bringing it to life of what does that, what does it really look like and feel like, how will I know the value of impact?'cause the danger is impact. It's, it's a generic statement, isn't it? So if, if I describe it in more specific terms, I can then understand whether a job, a, an industry, a relationship a work context, whether that actually is going to do that for me.

Rachael:

In terms of decision making, So I think there's something to trust and let go of here, which is that as we, as we understand more clearly what we value in life and what's important to us, and the qualities of the, the qualities that we bring in our behaviors and who we become to help us experience more of those things you trust and you let go, and actually life offers you more opportunities to show up in that way. And just because you've got the clarity. That helps to guide you,

Jimmy:

Right.

Rachael:

always a conscious executive

Jimmy:

yeah,

Rachael:

It's something that will sit more in the subconscious that will help to guide you. So I, I think there is something in this around people, once they have that clarity, trusting and letting go with that and seeing how the rubber hits the road, what are then the opportunities for them that come up day to day, and the big things, the little things and

Jimmy:

Yeah.

Rachael:

in between, that allows us to live more in accordance with those values. Now we have the clarity of them.

James:

So I think there's a really interesting point there, your point about doing this frequently. So if I was to go back, um, oh I dunno, 10 years. Where I had two young daughters. Yeah. Their mind values actually would be substantially different because the thing that was all important for me then was just making sure that they were, um, provided for that I was the breadwinner and they had what they needed. Yeah. Now, to be honest with you, one of'em is just about to leave university. The other one's just about to go to university. I'm 10 years older and I've made enough money that is not an issue for me anymore. So now I can take that one off the table and therefore focus on the things which are more important to me. being cognizant of what those are is really quite helpful.'cause otherwise I'd be flogging myself to death some corporate job trying to fulfill some old values, which are no longer important. And alright, I'm lucky I've got there. But it's more by look than judgment, whereas the actual process of going through what's important to me, how do I express that really well, it makes you happier in life, quite frankly.

Rachael:

frankly,

Jimmy:

To your point, Rachel, I guess when we're talking about what do we do, what do we now do with our values, now we've got them clear and we brought them to life. Where I was coming from was, is there something tangible I now do with it? I'm thinking if I'm looking for a new job. They might be helpful for that. You know, if I'm making decisions, if I'm thinking about why relationships are working or why they're not working, I can delve into that. So there, there are probably some tangible things that you could do with it, but I love your point, which is, you don't necessarily have to do tangible things just the fact that you understand what your values are and what's important to you subconsciously, that will sit with you and therefore you will start to act more in tune with those naturally.,

Rachael:

so to give you an example, love and connection are two of my, you know, top values

Jimmy:

Yeah.

Rachael:

have. And so that impacts how I show up in all the little interactions each and every day. Whether that's moments with my children who are younger and much smaller than yours, James. Or, you know, even with my clients or with you guys here today. They are that north star to help you with the

Jimmy:

Yeah,

Rachael:

Is this decision on this job and this career, is this gonna be aligned with my values? Is it going to help me when I'm clear on my criteria? Is this gonna help me experience more of this thing that is important to me, this value that's important to me, or less of that thing? um, so it can help with those big decisions, but also in trusting and letting go that it can help with you. You just experiencing more of that in day-to-day life.

Jimmy:

so you can.

James:

But of those things, it's one of those things which is blindingly obvious when you've said to you, but it's not blindingly obvious unless it's being said to you, which is if you want to succeed in life, chase the things you value. If you wanna chase the things you value, you better be flipping clear about

Jimmy:

Yeah,

James:

'cause actually you are said to me earlier on, you know, when did you last look at what your were, uh, 20 years

Jimmy:

yeah,

James:

I mean, that for me is the

Jimmy:

yeah.

James:

out of this is, be clear what you value and go there's that old, you know, saying if you want to be happy, stop doing the things that make you unhappy, which, you know, alright, lovely. But actually the thing about corporate values though is that if you're working somewhere where those values don't align with yours, being explicit about that and then making a, um, decision on the back of that actually also puts you in a very strong place. So it's not just your values, it's the values of those around you is what I'm trying to

Jimmy:

Yeah, and I think, I think, Rachel raised a, a really good point earlier as well, is it's not just the espoused values, it's not just what, somebody says, it's not just what is on the posters and on the PowerPoint slides it's how do actually people behave in line with that, and therefore does the, actual behavior line up with with what's important to you?

James:

So how would you summarize that then, Rachel? Then how would you, what would your key words of wisdom be?

Rachael:

Know what your values are, spend some time reflecting on those. Work through the worksheets that we're gonna provide and put in the show notes for people. And if you need to reach out for any support or help connect with me on LinkedIn to do that. And knowing what your values are is just, the super highway to experience more of what you love and have greater joy and fulfillment in your life.

James:

Very good.

Jimmy:

you

James:

you. very

Jimmy:

Yeah. Fantastic. Rachel. That was really, really useful.

James:

Super. All

Jimmy:

Thanks Rachel.

James:

you speak to you later, sir.

Jimmy:

Um, Rachel, don't, don't put

Speaker 4:

We cover a whole host of topics on this podcast from purpose to corporate jargon, but always focused on one thing, getting the job done well, easier said than done. So if you've got. Unhappy customers or employees, bosses or regulators breathing down your neck. If your backlogs are outta control and your costs are spiraling and that big IT transformation project that you've been promised, just keeps failing to deliver, we can help. If you need to improve your performance, your team's performance, or your organizations, get in touch at Jimmy at@jobdonewell.com orJames@jobdonewell.com.

People on this episode

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James Lawther

Co-host
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Jimmy Barber

Co-host
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Rachael Edmondson-Clarke

Guest