Values are fundamental motivators for people. When values guide decision-making, they shape what emerges in action, help align ‘talk and walk’, and foster a sense of integrity. Richard Barrett most recently defined values as ‘the energetic containers of our aspirations and intentions’. See http://richardbarrettblog.net/2014/05/20/what-are-values/) for reflection and online discussion. He’s also written a number of books, many of which I’ve listed in the bibliography available in Selected Resources – Values and Leadership following this section in my website.

Though exploring and deepening values has been important all my life, I was grateful to learn about the important research, writing, and training provided by the Barrett Values Centre (BVC), especially Richard Barrett’s research into the levels of consciousness and need reflected in various values.  Though I became a Certified Cultural Transformation Tools (CTT) Consultant with BVC in 2006, I’ve continued to learn from their cutting-edge work ever since.

If you’d like to explore your own top ten values, please consider taking the (free) Personal Values Assessment available on the Barrett Values Center website Personal Values Assessment at BVC. Not only will you receive a report addressing your values, but also, you’ll be given some tools to help you work with your values. If family members or friends take the assessment, too, you can share results with each other.

Another person I met through the Charter for Compassion’s EdNet group is Laura Burgis, founder of the Human Values Center (HVC) https://hvc-world.org. Not only has she trained with Richard Barrett, but she has integrated a variety of values approaches in her work. Through research, she has discovered that supporting local leadership in using values assessments as part of their Compassionate Cities initiatives (working with the Charter for Compassion) has been highly successful.

Also through the Charter’s EdNet group, I met Wendy Ellyatt, founder of The Flourish Project https://www.flourishproject.net. Integrating Richard Barrett’s levels of consciousness, Wendy and her team describe the Flourish Project in this way:

The Flourish Project introduces a new and powerful framework for understanding and mapping human wellbeing that promotes community involvement and whole-systems thinking. It helps everyone to explore the foundation of their own values and worldviews (the Roots of Difference) and to understand that individual wellbeing is always reliant on that of others and the natural world (the Path to Compassion).

As with Laura, I look forward to working with Wendy, especially in efforts to integrate the Flourish Project with the CIT program in service to people in care homes. Stay tuned.

Please explore the selected values resources I’ve provided. They always can be updated and improved, but they’re a good start.