A new year and new goals. The goal with the loudest ring?

‘To be more fulfilled’.

Personally and at work. One definition of fulfillment is simply “living your values”. It therefore, makes sense that to feel fulfilled in our work we need to make sure that our work aligns with our core values.

What better time then to re-evaluate the core values which drive and motivate us.?

Why does this matter? Well, knowing our values enables us to understand and clarify where we want to focus our energies on our personal and work lives.

Our core values are the handful of guiding principles by which we navigate our personal and career decisions. They require no external justification.

Like most successful brands we can think of, the most successful professionals build their career on a solid foundation of personal values and beliefs.

So if you’re reinvigorating or re-launching your career, it pays to think like a personal brand!

The exercise of identifying the core values of our personal brand, requires us to act with real  honesty to define what values are truly central to us.

TIPS ON HOW TO REDEFINE YOUR VALUES 

When you define your values, you discover what’s truly important to you. A good way of starting to do this is to look back and identify when you felt really good and really confident that you were making good choices.

1. Some questions you can ask yourself are :

• When I was happiest what was I doing? Who was I with and what factors contributed to my happiness? 

• When was I most proud and why? What other factors may have contributed to my feelings of pride?

• When were the times when I was most fulfilled and satisfied? What need or desire was fulfilled? How and why did the experience give my life meaning?

Here are some examples only of values :

What’s important is to create Your own.

Ambition Assertiveness Belonging Calmness Carefulness Commitment Compassion Competitiveness Curiosity Decisiveness Determination Diligence Discipline Discretion Excitement Exploration Expressiveness Fairness Faith Family-orientedness Fidelity Fitness Freedom Generosity Growth Happiness Hard Work Health Insightfulness Intuition Joy Love Loyalty Merit Openness Order Originality Positivity Practicality Professionalism Reliability Rigor Security Self-actualization Self-control Self-reliance Sensitivity Serenity Spontaneity Stability Status Success Thoroughness Thoughtfulness Timeliness Traditionalism Trustworthiness Truth-seeking Understanding Vitality

2. With these insights, your task is to choose a list of 10 key values that resonate with you. The key to this is to not judge your choices or to chose values you think you should have!

3. To prioritize these to your top 3 you can ask yourself: “If I had to choose between having A and NOT B, or having B and NOT A for the rest of my life – which would it be?”

4. Check your top-priority values, and make sure they fit with your life and your vision for yourself.

•Do these values make you feel good about yourself?

•Are you proud of your top three values?

•Would you be comfortable and proud to tell your values to people you respect and admire?

•Do these values represent things you would support, even if your choice isn’t popular, and it puts you in the minority?

5. Refer to these top 3 values in all your decision making and check in to ensure your energy is being directed to your guiding principles.