This is a handout from a workshop leader by Carol Kauffman, Executive Director, and Nick Craig, Authentic Leadership Institute at the European School for Management and Technology ( ESMT)  Annual Forum held in conjunction with the International Leadership Association. ( 2012)

Values are like the opposite of sex. With sex, people don’t talk about it. They do it, ideally behind closed doors. In contrast, when it comes to values, everyone shouts them from the rooftop, but they don’t do them every day, and certainly don’t allow themselves to be judged on their performance. In addition, the energizing impact of living one’s values is underappreciated and not utilized effectively in today’s corporate world. In this workshop we’ll look at how to translate one’s values into clear personal definitions and ambitions and then develop these into leadership principles that are visible and measurable and can help one tap more deeply into what matters to them at work as well as home.

We want to offer an intellectual and experiential opportunity for our participants to explore how to take their values and translate them into strategic action plans that can increase satisfaction, intrinsic motivations and hopefully performance. We’ll then consider how these could integrate into and support best practices.