By Steve Moran

Last week my good friend Denise Boudreau-Scott, President of Drive, presented a keynote speech for Pioneer Network on practical and proven strategies to retain staff.

She started with a refreshing disclosure. Her wisdom does not include things like higher pay and referral bonuses for one simple reason. THEY DON’T WORK!

Personal Values

This may sound a bit crazy, but Denise’s big life hack for retaining team members is to take a look at your personal values. Figure out what they are and then tap into those values.

It turns out that tapping into your personal values at work will help make you a better leader, which:

  • attracts the best staff who stay working for you, which
  • solves your staffing crisis, which
  • ultimately brings more residents through the door!

It is all about being true to yourself through your values. Because when you do you show up at work and life, as the best version of you. 

What Happens . . .

Too often in our field, organizations ask us to do things that are in conflict with our personal values. When you get asked to do these things, you end up feeling “icky”. If you haven’t spent much time clarifying your personal values, and most people haven’t, you feel icky yet you don’t really know why!

BUT, when you clarify your personal values, you face these kinds of challenges with great power! (Don’t worry, I’ll give you a link at the end so you can figure out your values and tap into that power!)

More Than That Though

Have you ever made a decision where you kinda, sorta knew you made the right decision, even though there was a lot of pressure to do something different? Of course, you have! Every single person has! Even though you know instinctively it is right, there’s a lot of second-guessing. Unless you have clarity on your personal values! If you have that, you are in the position of saying to yourself (and to others if necessary), “Here is why I did what I did.”

When there is a conflict between your personal values and your actions you inevitably wind up stressed out, frustrated, and eventually burned out. And far too often this disconnect turns us into ugly human beings who end up voluntarily violating our own values even more!

What Are Your Values?   

In under 5 minutes, you can determine your personal values by clicking on this link. You’ll choose the ten values that are most important to you from a list of words. A few minutes later, you’ll get an email telling you how those values are showing up in your everyday life. Spoiler Alert: It’s unbelievably accurate and will have you thinking about work and life through a very different lens!

Share your top three values in the comments below.