Overview

Your values are the powerful forces that guide and influence your decisions throughout your life. Values are what you consider most important in your life, and are reflected in what you actually do with your time.

Think about the past week...what did you spend your time doing? If you value good health, perhaps you made time for daily exercise and other healthly activities. If you value self awareness, perhaps you made time for reflection, reading and meditation.

You can think of values as the satisfaction you get from work. A person who values "helping others" and "communication" may enjoy occupations such as Teacher or Counselor.A person who values "being outdoors" and "adventure" may enjoy work with the Park Service or in Outdoor Leadership.

In this section, you will identify your top five work values. Identifying your work values will help you make meaningful decisions about the type of work you'd like to do...work that allows you to express your values.

 


Steps to completing the Work Values Exercise (refer your handout packet for the exercise):

  • Read through the list of values carefully. If you're not sure of what a word means, look it up in the dictionary.
  • Put a check mark next to the 10 values that you think are most important to you and that you would like to be able to express in your future career.
  • Review your list and decide which 5 values are most important.


Writing Assignment #3

Please send me an email, responding to the following items.
Refer to my example below.

  • Refer to the Work Values Exercise,and list your five work values in rank order.
  • Briefly describe how each of your top five values is important to you in your life.
  • Are your five values expressed in your current job? Explain how each of your values is or is not expressed in your current or most recent job. (If you have never had a job you do not have to respond to this question).
  • Email the assignment to mmiller@palomar.edu and mmiller@cts.com


My Example

My top five work values in rank order:

  1. Freedom
  2. Creative Expression
  3. Influencing Others
  4. Leadership Position
  5. Adventure

I value being in charge of my life...and having the freedom to make my schedule and work hours and times that suit me and my other interests. I would not be happy working in a rigid environment where there was a timeclock and set work hours. Freedom is a big part of why I enjoy working in higher education.

I enjoy creating...new curriculum, multimedia, webpages...my job allows me to develop new ideas, projects, and marketing materials for the Career Center.

As a teacher and counselor, I spend many hours listening to others and providing my ideas, and suggestions. It gives me great satisfaction to be able to reach out to others and attempt to inspire, challenge and influence them...it doesn't always work, but it is rewarding when it does.

I like being my own boss and running the show and that's why leadership is important to me...as the Career Center Director I get to "be in charge", make decisions, manage people and projects, develop goals and evaluate progress...it's challenging and constantly changing, and I enjoy that.

Adventure is an important value but one that I don't express directly in my job at Palomar College.I express my value in adventure through my interest in challenging outdoor activities (kayaking,paddlesurfing, skiing) and international travel. These activities are planned during my non-work life. Sometimes I get up early in the morning to go surfing before coming to work at midday. I'm fortunate to have a job, that allows me that flexibility.

Values Collage

Value clarification is soul searching work. Because we tend to live busy stressful lives it is sometimes difficult to define what is really important to us. One way to help you define values, is to find pictures or illustrations in magazines that you find interesting and attrative. Look at the pictures and see if some themes emerge...are there pictures of people? adventurous activities? Cut out the pictures and make them into a collage.

This is an optional activity but I'd like to know what you discovered if you choose to do this exercise.
The pictures below illustrate my top values.

Leadership Position

Freedom and Adventure

Creative Expression

Influencing Others