Hathaway’s character in ‘The Devil Wears Prada’ gradually began to live someone else’s values in the name of professional performance and accelerated business results …

If you haven’t seen this film yet, grab it on DVD and watch it through the lenses of living your values at work and at home.

Hathaway’s character begins by being very clear about what’s important to her (her values). Her lifestyle and relationships reflect those values.

In a naive attempt to gain professional experience and win connections that may accelerate her career opportunities in the future she takes a position in an industry in which she has no interest (no values alignment), and for a boss for whom she has respect (again, no values alignment).

As the story progresses we observe a gradual letting go of the lifestyle and relationships that Hathaway’s character had valued previously, although she was not consciously aware that her Motivation Code was changing.

Her wake up call came when the boss she despised (Streep’s character) told Hathaway’s character that she could recognize some of herself in the younger woman … a powerful and poignant moment in the film, leading to her ditching the job, and asking her loved one’s to forgive her.

Successful people know what their values are, and know how to live their values…

Here’s the point … this actually happens in real life too! Hathaway’s character appeared to be winning at work, but the cost of victory was that she was no longer true to herself and what she REALLY valued. If she had not seen the light, she would have eventually spat the dummy, burned out, or lived a life of ’success’ without satisfaction.

Your values are your lifestyle priorities and preferences and are with you 24/7. They determine what you think, say and do – at home and at work, so you really want to know what your values are, so that you can make conscious choices to live and work in a way that aligns with your core values.

Where do your values come from?

From your world-view … the subject of my next post.

For many years the urge to share what I have learned about how to maximize your professional performance AND stay true to what you really value has burned in my spirit.

My passion is to see men and women liberated from the constraints of conventional wisdom about what it takes to win at work, and empowered by the truth, backed up by the principles and practices that deliver real results.

And now I know for certain that the Win at Work Book WILL be written and published!

How do I know? Glenn Dietzel at Awaken the Author Within has just announced that I am a joint winner for live mentoring in his Books Mean Credibility program. This was a global competition and I am truly humbled to have been chosen as a joint winner, along with Laurie Kirk of USA. 

Here’s the video announcement of the competition winners.

Why am I asking for your help?

It’s very important to me that the finished Win at Work Book is as real and useful as possible for my readers, so I am still conducting surveys and collecting case studies from employers, employees and small business owners.

How can you help?

If you are willing to be involved in surveys, short courses and case studies you can register your interest here

Your registration will also give you access to some useful freebies and sneak previews of the Win at Work book.

Win at work with inspiring quotes and sparks of wisdom to fuel your fire

When I made the decision to write and publish my book, I realized that there would be days when I needed a boost of external motivation to keep me moving forward on the project. So, I have been finding and sending to myself Mini Motivators on topics that keep me focused and on track.

I’m happy to share them with you too. Follow this link to get the sparks you need to fan your fire into the triple flames of inspiration, reflection and action.

By the way, the book’s working title is Win at Work – how to maximize your professional performance AND stay true to your values. What do you think of the title? I might hold a Create The Best Title competition when the book is closer to the publishing date.

In the meantime, enjoy and activate your Mini Motivators.

Sherlock Holmes was an expert at culling clues and cracking codes to find answers to the mysteries he investigated.

Your future professional performance and in fact the whole of your life are to some extent mysteries waiting to be investigated and solved.

Here’s a great collection of practical strategies we can learn from the fictional Sherlock Holmes and his colleague Dr Watson to help us win at work AND be true to our values … enjoy!

What can you learn from a man, a boy and a donkey about how to win at work, AND stay true to your values?

Do you know what really motivates you and how valuable that knowledge can be? Check out the short story in this video for your first clue …

What do you stand for? What’s your hidden value? Watch the next video in the series here. I would love to hear from you, so please leave your feedback in the comments box below.

Your Hidden Value – discover what REALLY motivates you to win at work

This 10 minute video is a sneak preview of one of the learning activities in my online course My Hidden Value. It explores the connection between your values, your beliefs, a sense of meaning in your work, and the impact of these on your motivation to win at work. Let me know what you think about the information in the video Values, Meaning and Beliefs.

Is it useful? Share your wisdom and leave a comment in the comments box. You may need to click on the Comments Box to open it so you can leave a comment.

What does it mean to "live your values?"

G’day from Sydney, Australia …

A recent controversial performance on American Idol provides a great example of the power generated by being clear about what you value (your motivation code) and what action you are willing to take to express that value fully in your life.

The performance triggered a massive number of postings and responses on YouTube. Here’s what happened … on April 9 American Idol closed with a performance of Darlene Zschech’s contemporary Christian worship song, "Shout to the Lord."

Just one small oversight … they changed the lyrics without the composer’s permission. Their version started with "My shepherd …" instead of "My Jesus …" Here’s the April 9 version

So Darlene, being true to her highest core value (worshiping Jesus), contacted them and pointed out their error. Not because she wanted any recognition or to wield power, but because she believes that the lyrics were given to her by God to inspire Christians around the world to heartfelt worship, and because she would be denying her most deeply held value if she lay down and played doormat to such a blatant dilution of the lyrics.

The result? On April 10 Idol presented a revised arrangement and included the God given lyrics of "Shout to the Lord". In my opinion (and I’m not a musician) the second version was a much more inspired and inspiring arrangement. Here’s the April 10 rendition

The big question is: what motivated the producers of American Idol to take liberties with the lyrics of a copyrighted song?

In exploring the possibilites the first thing we need remember is that our values are our primary motivators, our lifestyle priorities and preferences, our motivation code. What we value is what we want more of in our life. So we make decisions and take certain actions in an attempt to get more of what we want. When we get more of what we want, we are living our values.

The second thing we need to recognize about values is that our values compete with each other for our attention, sometimes causing value conflicts within ourselves.

A third and very significant factor is that our core values can create powerful passions that call for a deep emotional response when threatened or stifled.

So here’s my educated guess about what led the American Idol producers to change the lyrics of Shout to the Lord … a misguided marketing decision, based on a lack of clarity about the core values of a huge chunk of their viewers.

Wanting to reach the widest possible audience, without offending anyone, they assumed the best way of doing that would be to water down the lyrics, to avoid alienating the non Christians or anti Christians in the Idol tribe.

In effect, they tried to represent a worship song as a "generic" inspirational song. The difficulty with that approach is that our values are NOT generic, they are specific and in reality it is impossible to present "value neutral" entertainment, because every decision and action in each person’s life is based on values that are not only specific, but are also personal and emotionally charged.

What the American Idol producers grossly underestimated was the passion of millions of Christians around the world for the core values expressed in "Shout to the Lord", which is the most widely recognized and sung contemporary Christian worship song across the globe.

Responding to the outcry of tens of thousands of viewers globally, Idol producers made the smart marketing move to represent the song with a new arrangement and the original lyrics.

Millions of Christians loved it. Tens of thousands expressed their appreciation in comments on YouTube. Some expressed their opposition. Thank God for democracy! Personally, I’m grateful to live in a democratic society where we have freedom of religious expression.What we all need to remember is that freedom walks hand in hand with responsibility … and responsibility walks hand in hand with respect for the values of others.

Full credit to American Idol for a timely response to what could have been a marketing disaster. They recognized and responded to the values driven call for a change of direction, and the publicity that has resulted from the initial blunder and the subsequent correction could not be purchased at any price.

And full credit to Darlene Zschech for walking her talk (or should that be "singing her song"?)… clearly she has cracked her personal and unique motivation code and is willing to allow her values and actions to shout to the Lord.

An invitation to comment on this post … Is my take on the Idol happenings on the mark? What do you feel was behind it all?

Do you know your unique motivation code (your values)? Do your actions align with your values?

To win at work AND stay true to your values, you need to be able to answer YES to both questions.

Here’s a story that illustrates the point …

The Tale of the Man, the Boy and the Donkey

An old man, a boy and their donkey were going to town. The boy rode the donkey and the old man walked. As they went along, they passed some people who remarked it was a shame that the old man was walking when the boy was riding. The man and boy thought maybe these critics were right, so they changed places.

Later, they passed some people who remarked, "What a shame that he makes the little boy walk". So they then decided they would both walk.

Soon, they passed some more people who thought they were stupid to walk when they had a decent donkey to ride. So they both rode the donkey.

Next they passed some people that shamed them by saying how awful to put such a load on a poor donkey. The boy and man thought they were probably right, so they decided to carry the donkey.

As they crossed a bridge, they lost their grip on the animal and it fell into the river and drowned.

The moral of the story … If you try to please everyone, you might as well kiss your ass good-bye!

How does this apply to winning at work, without sacrificing your values?

When your goals and actions are based on your own values and value priorities, (your unique motivation code), you are much more likely to remain consistent in your focus, and therefore achieve your professional performance targets more readily.

Take a minute to share one of your wins or losses based on being true or NOT true to your personal values, in the comments box below …

Customer service focus: essential to excellence in professional performance

In previous posts I’ve identified two of the three dimensions that are essential for you to win at work without sacrificing your values:

• Engagement of your talent code
• Meaning, which stems from values alignment, your unique motivation code

In this post I’ll give a quick overview of the third:

• Customer service focus.

 Your customers or clients might be internal or external, individuals or corporations, paying or non-paying (as in community service clients)

Your customer service knowledge and skills may be expanded by training, strengthened by practising, or adjusted to meet changed needs or circumstances.

Your customer service attitude however cannot be improved by the above methods because it stems directly from your values. Your attitude can change if you CHOOSE a suitable path of integrated personal and professional development, which is based on your unique motivation code AND the aligned values of your employer.

Your customer service knowledge, skills and attitude can be maximized if:

• your personal values are service oriented (it’s not about you) AND
• your employer’s values behind their customer service practices are service oriented

The points I’ve just made have one thing in common – values alignment. We can conclude that identifying and prioritizing your core values (your unique motivation code) is essential if you want to excel in each of the three dimensions of winning at work: Engagement Meaning Customer Service Focus

Do you know how to identify and prioritize your values, how to crack your unique motivation code? Post your comments, questions or suggestions in the comments box below.

Next post: Value Your Life, Live Your Values – Why you need to live your values in order to win at work and avoid burnout

Why engagement helps you to WIN AT WORK without sacrificing your values

My previous post identified 3 dimensions of professional growth that are vital to your professional performance – engagement, meaning and a customer focus.

Remember that engagement at work stems from actively applying your natural talent code at work. Highly engaged workers display more confidence, more intense focus & higher productivity than non or poorly engaged workers. Let’s examine each of those benefits:

Confidence

Success at work breeds confidence. Success comes from engagement with your work. Engagement comes from working on tasks for which you have a natural talent. When you develop that talent code into professional strengths, and have daily opportunities to apply your strengths to produce quality work, your confidence soars and leads to even deeper levels of engagement … an upward spiral of performance and success.

Focus

Maintaining the motivation to stay “on task” and focused is a real challenge to all of us if we are not working in our strength zone AND working on tasks we value. Your values are your inner desires, and one of the keys to motivation. Think back to a time or situation when you felt successful, and were able to maintain focus on your tasks for extended periods of time … I can guarantee that you valued what you were doing, and had a natural aptitude for the skills required to succeed.

Productivity

Peak performance stems from the alignment of the task at hand with your strength zone and your values. We can express that as a simple formula: * strengths + values + aligned task = productivity.

Transform yourself into a valuable employee by applying this formula for professional performance.

Are you ready to maximize your engagement at work? Post your comments, questions or suggestions in the comments box below.

Live your values: find meaning in your work

My next post will reveal why you need to find meaning in your work to win at work without and avoid burnout