“As for my interest in diversity, I believe it is closely aligned with my work on the project, Giving Voice To Values. That is, there are often times when we may witness or personally experience situations where some individuals are not treated with the same respect or care as others, precisely due to some difference in their identities, their styles, their experiences, or their perspectives. Often it is difficult to speak up in such a situation, for ourselves or for others.” GivingBelieveCareValuesIndividualSpeakI BelieveDifficultInterestSituationStyleIdentityPerspectiveDiversityWitness Author:Mary C. Gentile
“I am most comfortable in a "learner" role, I may raise my values-related concerns by asking the well-crafted and well-timed question, rather than by strenuously arguing a particular point of view. Or if I am a risk-taking, aggressive manager, I may frame the values conflict as just one more challenge that I want to take on, as opposed to a "constraint" on my action choices.” ActionValuesChoicesChallengesConflictConcernPoint Of ViewArguingAggressive Author:Mary C. Gentile
“Interestingly, many of the organizational characteristics that have been identified as conducive to effectively managing diversity and as conducive to fostering innovation and creativity in the workplace are also important for enabling employees to voice their values.” ImportantValuesCreativityDiversityInnovationEmployeeWorkplaceOrganizational Author:Mary C. Gentile
“When leaders are willing to talk through their own decision-making process, making visible that values are an important consideration, this sends a powerful signal to employees.” ImportantValuesPowerfulLeaderEmployeeConsideration Author:Mary C. Gentile
“Typically efforts to address values and ethics in business education and leadership development tend to focus on building Awareness and teaching Analysis. That is, we expose future leaders to the kinds of ethical and values conflicts they may encounter, so that they will recognize them and will have considered them in advance.” KindValuesEffortLeaderFocusTeachingAwarenessBuildingConflictEthicsEthical Author:Mary C. Gentile
“We are better able to bring the same sort of pragmatic planning and analytical pre-work to our values scripts that we would bring to any other business position that we espouse. This approach enables us to be more reasonable, more respectful, less impulsive and more constructive. Risk cannot be eliminated entirely but that is true in all of life.” ValuesRiskPlanningRespectfulPragmaticImpulsive Author:Mary C. Gentile
“Often we fail to voice and act on our values because, before we even apply our best thinking to developing an action plan, we engage in process of "pre-emptive rationalization." At some deep level, we anticipate difficulty and resistance so we start to back away from our own instinctive values perspective.” ThinkingActionValuesFailingPerspectiveDifficulty Author:Mary C. Gentile