About This Book

First and foremost, I want to assure you that this book is for current and would-be leaders, managers, entrepreneurs, solopreneurs, and every other person who exchanges in the art of commerce. I’ve done my best to include a few key entry points for those who aren’t in “traditional” business setups. And just about everything in this book can be used for more than one purpose. Don’t shy away from a chapter just because it doesn’t seem to pertain to you at first glance. You may be very surprised by what you learn about yourself. Self-reflection plays a central role throughout this process. Without it, you’ll be flying blind. Seeing ourselves, our true motives, and how the decisions we make affect many lives requires such introspection.

Values-Based Leadership For Dummies isn’t meant to be read as a step-by-step manual. However, you’ll need to embrace some foundational principles and attitudes in order to make use of many of the other tools. If you’re reading something that isn’t quite making sense to you, I suggest you go to Parts 1 and 2 to find the core principle and meaning of why certain tools are important in the process.

Be warned: I’m going to offer you a different way of viewing leadership and business as a whole. Understanding that commerce is a vehicle for something good, even noble, will forever change how you lead other people. It will also change how you look at your role in this grand play. Your role is to create businesses and teams that serve one another and the community around you, and corporate social responsibility (CSR) is the way to achieve this. This all may sound grandiose, but I assure you that it’s no longer an option — it’s the way things are now, and it’s become the normal expectation of employees. Preparing for that will assure survival of your leadership.

The principles of VBL establish a platform to create a great company culture where people are focused on living the values set forth by the leader and the organization. This creates a ripple effect into every nook and cranny of the organization: your business model, investing in your team, building strong partnerships, cultivating future leaders, improving communication, and making sure people are the right fit for the organization. Collaboration is the environment where people win. And this is all built on the foundation you set using trust as the key ingredient.

I’m a pretty straightforward person. I’m not very good at hinting around without telling you what’s really going on. In this book you find real steps and concrete activities to help you move through situations. You find real stories of real experiences. Don’t you just hate when people skirt around the issue and never get to the meat? Me too! Or they tell you they did something amazing but won’t share how they made it happen. Ugh. It’s so annoying. That won’t happen here.

Some of the stories appear in shaded boxes called sidebars. They’re skippable, though when you get the chance you may enjoy reading them. My clients and some of my own personal experiences are pretty amusing. I’ve also provided some juicy info marked with the Technical Stuff icon to appeal to analytical types who want to know the what, how, and why. Figures and lists are sprinkled throughout for maximum saturation of concepts, facts, and processes.

One more thing: You may notice that some web addresses break across two lines of text. If you’re reading this book in print and want to visit one of these web pages, simply key in the web address exactly as it’s noted in the text, pretending as though the line break doesn’t exist. If you’re reading this as an e-book, you’ve got it easy — just click the web address to be taken directly to the web page.

Foolish Assumptions

Assumptions can sometimes get us into trouble. However, it’s really important that we’re all on the same page together. So, for the moment forget what they say about making assumptions and have a look at the following laundry list. I assume that you

• Are a leader or manager or aspire to be such.
• Find your current workplace landscape mildly or severely out of step with who you are and what you stand for.
• Want to improve your leadership skills.
• Think your workplace needs to evolve but aren’t sure how to go about it.
• Are ready to take the reins and make things better for everyone.

Additional assumptions about you, on a more personal level, are that

• You’re seeking some joy, fun, and energy in your leadership.
• You’ve had enough of stodgy, old-school leadership and know it needs some lightening up.
• You’ve got a healthy sense of humor and an adventurous spirit.
• You’ve got a big heart and want to balance profits with your desire to do good in this world.

Beyond the Book

If you’re more of a get-to-the-point, read-it-on-my-phone-during-my-commute, quick-reference kind of person, I’ve got something to suit your style. To view this book’s Cheat Sheet, simply go to www.dummies.com and search for “Values-Based Leadership For Dummies Cheat Sheet” to find a handy reference guide that answers common questions about VBL.

More bonus materials can be found on www.VBLeader.com and www.MariaGamb.com. There you’ll find a very cool infographic pathway to VBL that will keep you focused and on track. You can also subscribe to my newsletter while you’re there to receive tips and reminders that are short, sweet, and to the point. Best of all, all of that is completely free.

Should you decide you’d like to learn more about VBL training, communication skills, or signature Values 2 Vision Retreats, you can find it on the website or drop me a line at info@mariagamb.com. I customize all training and coaching programs to the needs of the users and the company.

Understanding the Escalator Effect of Values-Based Leadership

VBL continues the evolution of how we choose to engage in business. It’s the next step in the integration of one of the initial Conscious Capitalism principles: Business is good, noble, and heroic because it provides ethical opportunities for everyone.

VBL expands on Conscious Capitalism using a specific, yet customizable, set of values as the platform for norms of doing business with others and internally. Each step in this leadership model (see Figure 1-1) leads to an organization that performs at maximum capacity.

Within each of the five sectors in Figure 1-1, specific tasks, actions, and behaviors need to be instituted. This is the starting point of your journey — the awareness of what I will unfold in this book. Here is an overview of what each sector means:

• Values-Based Principles: There is a difference between what’s implied and what’s expected. Clarity on which principles are selected by each leader for themselves and their organizations is the foundation for the process.
• Character of Leadership: You’ll hear me say many times that character can’t be faked. It can be evolved and directed in more constructive ways, but it’s not something you can fake, not for long. It is who you are. On our journey, I’ll show you how, where, and why you need to expand on who you are to become the leader others really need and want right now. Flip to Part 2 for more information.
• Building an Environment of Trust: This is the part of your company culture that’s crucial — without it, you’ll fail. Trust in the leadership, one another, and the path you’re all on together will determine how productive your teams will be. Simply put, if they don’t trust you, they most certainly won’t follow you, at least not wholeheartedly. Part 3 (especially Chapter 9) has more information.
• Employees Engaged: Either they’re part of the process and the organization’s success, or they aren’t. Your willingness to invest in them will speak volumes to them. That investment comes in a variety of applications, such as training, development, benefits, perks, and simply making them part of the process. Check out Part 4 (particularly Chapter 15) for guidance.
• Performing at Maximum Capacity: The first four elements bring us to this point. Let’s reverse the thought process. Engaged employees who are actively involved in the company’s success are working from a place of trust. They are all in. This was achieved because the leader has led by example with clarity, consistency, and empathy. People love working with people who they truly believe have their best interests at heart, and not just the bottom line.

So, are you in? Your reaction to the top-level view will tell you a lot about your own capacity to evolve, change, grow, and adapt. What’s your willingness level at this point? Rank it from one to five. One means “I’m really not interested at all.” (I highly doubt these individuals are reading this book.) Three means, “You’ve got my attention but I’m not sure,” and five means, “I’m all in.”

If you’re at a three, teetering in either direction, read on. Fours and fives, you’re definitely in the right place.

Avoiding a Flatline to Extinction: When You Know Change Is Needed

There’s a concept in nature called bifurcation. Bifurcation is a process that nature takes to renew itself. Usually it involves a disruption or inflammation that precipitates a split, a morphing into two. For example, deep forests are prone to fires. Within the forest are types of trees, spores, and other flora that require excessive heat for them to reproduce. With fire, they grow and multiply. Without it, they rot and die. One branch of possibility becomes life-affirming as a result of the disruption, and the other (without the disruption) could lead to the species becoming extinct.

When we apply bifurcation to business, we see that normal disruptions happen, and as a result — for example, the market crash in 2008 or massive corruption scandals — the system is forced to make a choice: review, reflect, and enact change, or do nothing at all (see Figure 1-2). Doing the latter often results in the company petering out into extinction. Many companies and their leadership have taken this route. Sure, sometimes staying the course and holding steady are great. But at some point, we all must upgrade our systems, thinking, and ways of being to continue to be viable.

Not all disruptions or course corrections are a result of such large issues as I’ve described. Consider the following as potential signs that a change is needed in the leadership approach:

• Excessive competition: While competition will occur, overly aggressive and destructive or disruptive behavior will crumble teams. The attributes and principles of values-based leadership become the remedy (see Chapters 6 and 7).
• Exclusions and exceptions: Creating an environment where only some people need to follow the rules disrupts the level playing field of fairness where everyone has access to opportunities. You can read more about this topic in Chapters 9 and 17.
• Excessive gossip and rumors: These are key indicators that there is a lack of communication and lack of trust seeping into the organization. See Chapter 7.
• Team failure: Teams fail to work together to reach their goals. This topic is covered throughout this book, but a great place to start is Chapter 9.
• Us versus them: When teams, managers, and leaders are pitted against one another, progress is inhibited. The antithesis of these behavior is detailed in Chapter 4.
• Employee turnover: High levels of turnover create gaps in wisdom and continuity in the organization. Find out more about the cost of high turnover rates in Chapter 15.
• The decline of trust and motivation: These elements create the foundation where people work together for the greater good of all involved. See Chapters 9 and 10 for more information.
• Lack of ownership: Leaders and employees who aren’t tapped into the vision, mission, or purpose for the organization’s work create apathy. Chapters 3 and 4 cover various aspects of building purpose into the workplace.
• Stagnation: Lack of innovation in processes, problem solving, products, services, production, sourcing, and technology causes a great deal of frustration for employees. Innovation, in general, is covered in Chapter 18, but you’ll notice the breadcrumb trail of each of these issues addressed throughout this book.

The preceding bullets cover just some of the many issues you can list as reasons to consider making a change. If I missed your particular reason, feel free to write it on a sticky note and place it in this chapter as a reminder of why you’re here with me now. Either way, Figure 1-2 illustrates the crossroads.

Once the decision is made that something must change, which is where I think you may be in this moment, the next step is to conduct a review to determine how to course correct and then roll out adaptive action and rewrite the future. You may be on a course that’s not sustainable. People may begin walking away from the company (see Chapter 19), or apathy may continue to weigh down progress. I’ve seen both happen. In your heart, you’re probably thinking, I just need to give this one more shot before I walk away. Or: This place has massive potential, but things have to change.

What’s scary is when leaders either refuse to see they have a problem or don’t care enough to make any changes. That, inevitably, leads to extinction — dismissal of leadership and potentially the failure of the company.

However, you don’t need to wait for your most senior leadership to embrace the principles and attributes laid out in this book. You can get started wherever you are in your organization. Chapter 12 shows you how to do this; there are prompts for those of you who may be on a solo journey inside an organization or who are entrepreneurs.

You make the choice to grow, change, and adapt and create a brighter future — or not. To make this choice, you need to be a leader who is open-minded, ruthlessly self-aware, and willing to look at the truth of your results. You also need to be savvy enough to understand that the world of business is changing. Will you keep up or be left behind?

Although remnants of the old, establishment way of operating linger on, this Millennial wave is becoming tremendously influential and will continue to lead us into a more progressive view of business. Already leaders of today are required to deploy a more comprehensive set of tools that go well beyond a technical skill set and a lofty education. Empathy and awareness are being added to leaders’ skill set. So-called “soft skills” are no longer considered intangibles. They’re a big component of why people will want to work for you and with you, and why they’ll aspire to follow the leadership image you provide for them.

Throughout this book I provide you with several different situational applications of these and other soft tools. The most important is the use of self-reflection to gain insight into yourself and your motivations. You must consider what it will mean for you to operate in a “we” rather than “me” environment (see Chapter 3). Reframing how to view business differently sets the foundation for your journey. You’ll encounter the following questions again and again in subsequent chapters because this is always going to be your check-in point:

• Is what I’m doing about me — or about them?
• Who is this serving — me or them?
• Am I setting up a culture that evolves around me — or around us?

You have to assess the selflessness of your leadership. You’ll need to make decisions that affect the whole. Knowing which course to take may become murky, but be sure that you’re thinking of the whole — the we — of the organization. When it gets into me territory, you’re in trouble. Everyone has a survival mechanism that’s designed to look out for number one — to protect yourself. But when it comes to your leadership role, we must always be part of the equation.

Building Winning Organizations: Culture Eats Strategy for Lunch

Management expert Peter Drucker once said, “Culture eats strategy for lunch.” This is one of those statements that should be posted in your workspace. Your company culture will make or break your success because your culture is a reflection of you and how you’ve set up the engagement for the entire organization. Although there are some outside factors that you may not be able to control 100 percent of the time, such as rogue leaders or managers, the overall tone of the organization rests on the ground rules you establish (the values) for engagement that establish the working conditions both internally and externally. (See Part 2 for full details.)

Creating that environment of trust and a culture of engagement means people are, literally, engaged and felt taken care of. Employees will stay with a leader they know has their best interests at heart longer than they’ll stay with one who doesn’t know their name or care about them. This isn’t a kumbaya situation I’m talking about. It’s about treating others with dignity and respect. This culture wins out every time when coupled with clear direction, goals, and support to exceed expectations. Playing loose won’t get you past the goalpost — structure and clarity are what channel talent and enthusiasm toward a productive end. (Check out Part 3 for more information.)

On the flip side, an organization full of apathetic, downtrodden, low-energy employees is usually not operating under focused leadership. It’s nearly impossible unless one of the field-level leaders corrals them and applies VBL at that point of interaction. And if that happens, it still means only one team is productive. Guess what? That will lead to resentment. Although there will always be a portion of the workforce who is happy to just come in, do nothing, and collect a paycheck, fortunately that’s not everyone.

Being aware of who is willing and hungry for direction is the way to start to mobilize a potentially demoralized group of people. People will follow those who offer hope. Through VBL, you’ll be able to extend that feeling to harness the amazing talent in your organization. In the following sections, I introduce the two vital components of building a winning organization: values and character.

Managers and leaders in the field can create their own private nirvanas using VBL principles, as you find out in Chapter 12. This version addresses how you can fill in the gap between your employees and potentially leaders above you who are either too busy or uninterested in VBL as a solution. It’s not always easy, but it can be done successfully.