Women in Leadership Conference: Recap & Core Values Exercise
I was invited to lead a breakout session at the Women in Leadership Conference, hosted by Tepper Women in Business. The event invited women and male allies from Pittsburgh and beyond to attend, and the crowd certainly was a great mix of current CMU students, prospective students, alumni, local business professionals, and others in the academic community.
For more info on the Conference, please see here: https://www.cmu.edu/tepper/why-tepper/our-community/womens-conference.html
Session Title: Powerful Partnerships.
Our chosen partners have significant influence over our goal achievement and success. Are you choosing a partner who aligns with your personal, career, and other life goals? This interactive session will help you articulate your core values, build self-awareness, and recognize the power of partnerships.
The Background:
One of the main activities a leader can do is set a vision. This vision sets the team on course. It goes the team a purpose. It motivates and gives direction. But, where does this vision really come from? What are the influencing forces of the leader’s vision? Surely, there are market forces and stakeholder needs at play, but at the very basic levels, a vision comes from the leader’s personal values. People start companies because they believe in something. This belief is rooted in a leader’s core values: values like curiosity, transparency, recognition, wealth, flexibility, family, or many others.
As we think about ourselves as leaders, what vision are we setting for ourselves? How can we set an authentic vision if we’re not clear on our own values? This is what the Powerful Partnerships workshop started to uncover.
“As we think about ourselves as leaders, what vision are we setting for ourselves? How can we set an authentic vision if we’re not clear on our own values? ”
Like most people, I have experienced both good and bad relationships. Bad ones have the power to debilitate careers, stall progress, and break down confidence over time. The simple fact is, if we’re not happy with our home life (whatever it may look like: married, partners, kids, caregivers, pets, etc), we’re not bringing our best selves to work every day. Our relationships have one of the biggest influences over our personal goal attainment. If we know our values, and can articulate them to our partners in an honest dialogue, our chances of alignment, cooperation, mutual respect, and success increase significantly.
My Takeaways from the Session:
We had lively participation and great questions from the audience. The exercise we did together brought the ideas of guiding principles, core values, and compromise together. What values are important to you now? What values might change over time? Which values are non-negotiable? Which values are important for your partner to have, whether s/he is a real partner or a yet-to-be-partner?
I introduced the well-loved Venn diagram of "me, you, us” to help participants visualize where their core values may fall. This tool is a great conversation starter - whether that conversation is with your partner, or even with your “future self”.
The audience left with more self-awareness, more confidence in their authentic selves, and equipped with tools to help them navigate conversations with partners.
Thank you to the participants, and thank you to the Tepper School of Business for inviting me to lead a breakout session!
