How to use values to solve conflict.

When we feel conflict or injustice, anger or frustration, it’s often because our values are being stepped on.

A value is something that’s important to you in your life (like fairness, freedom, or fun) and our emotions give us a nudge when the values we hold are not being honoured - either by ourselves or others.

One of my top values is family.

If I’ve made a family commitment, for example, to attend a school sports day, and something at work means I can’t go – I’m going to be annoyed. Because work is stepping on my value of family.

Knowing what your top values are (and other people’s) can be really insightful. Once you know someone’s top values, it becomes much easier to work and interact with them.

A friend of mine was struggling to communicate with a colleague at work. I’d go as far to say they were rubbing each other up the wrong way. After spending some time talking through what was happening, I asked him “What do you think your colleague values most?”

After giving it some thought he said, “independence and connection”. “Ahh. That could make sense then,” I said. “Perhaps your need to know the detail is pushing against their need to manage the project independently. How can you help them feel more independent and increase your connection with them?” He came up with some ideas.

Then we explored, “Which of your values do you think they are stepping on?”

His colleague had been contacting him with work requests in the evening when he was spending time with his family. Family was his top value and being constantly contacted out of work hours was having an impact on that.

He now had some options to move forward! Either ask the colleague to contact him out of hours only when it was really urgent, or choose not to look at his work channels on his phone.

Exploring values helped him think about the conflict from a different perspective and gave him a new way to approach his problem.

Next time you are getting angry, frustrated or cross, get curious. Ask yourself, “Which of my values is being stepped on here? How can I fight for it, or honour it?”