Attributes of Values-Based Leadership

One of the many goals of values-based leadership is to reiterate and communicate the ethos and values of the community or organization to like-minded individuals within those cultures. The result? Improving the cohesiveness, collaboration, and teamwork of all those involved and communicating the expectations through the stated values.

With values-based leadership in mind, there are several attributes and traits a values-based leader should identify and understand, those being:

• Self-reflection
• Balance
• Humility
• Authenticity
• Continuous Improvement

Perhaps the most crucial attribute in any leadership, self-reflection, deals with taking time to reflect on their own decisions, motivation, and values each day. Doing so helps discover faults and biases and determines what values matter to them and their team members. Strong leaders should examine and be honest with themselves and willing to accept responsibility. Self-reflection is aided by feedback from others above, your friends, or otherwise. These outside perspectives can offer viewpoints to address personal blind spots and make decisions with more understanding of the big picture and in a way that sticks to their values.

Balance is the trait of levering a balanced viewpoint, an objective lens, in different situations. Understand the different views and diversity among the team while determining the optimal course of action. Doing so allows for better decision-making with objectivity and higher trust among the team.

Humility in leadership is perhaps the most challenging attribute to master, as understanding the need for humility is humbling itself. Humility knows that leaders are no different from those who make up their organization or community; we are all human. Humble leaders excel at making their workers feel valuable by believing that they are just as useful as them, going above and beyond to protect, praise, and encourage the team.

Authenticity refers to honesty and transparency among leadership. Genuine actions and behaviors encourage individuals to follow; values-based leaders should be authentic in the beliefs of their values and stick to them both inside and outside of the leadership environment. It is not a front but something they genuinely believe in. Authentic leaders should be self-aware to engage in this social intelligence and integrate their values whenever possible. 

Lastly, continuous improvement is required for any good leader, especially in today’s ever-changing world. Values-based leaders should never be fully-satisfied and always be looking for potential improvement. Improvement in communication with their team, developing stronger relationships, increasing performance levels, and striving for continuous improvement are essential aspects of being a values-based leader. Each of these attributes contributes to being a great values-based leader.