Knowing your values helps you live authentically and is an important factor for women in finding balance, especially those with caring responsibilities.
There are plenty of quizzes around that can help you figure out your values, but sometimes an experience is what’s really needed. Recently, a job interview unexpectedly helped me uncover some of my core values about work and family. All I needed to do was challenge the status quo, listen to myself and recognise my true values.
So here’s what happened.
Challenging the status quo
I’ve been wondering recently if a consultancy is still the right type of work for me, or whether I should return to being an employee (as opposed to self-employed).
Consulting plays to my strengths. It is flexible and varied, and usually fun. But it can be lonely, with workflow and income uncertain. And you have to do all your own admin.
Employment, meanwhile, offers stability: set hours, set roles, set tasks and set income too. But too often employment can lead to stagnation, and then there’s office politics and all the rest of it to deal with.
So I thought one way to help answer whether employment was right for me would be to explore the market a little and take a closer look at the jobs currently available. I found a couple of interesting looking roles (although not necessarily a perfect match on paper) and, in the spirit of exploration, decided to apply.
Listen to yourself
One role I came across for a start-up seemed intriguing, but it was hard to know what the business was really about. I was invited to an interview and offered the job. But, being a start-up, I didn’t have enough information about the company or the role to accept immediately. So I requested another meeting to find out. And boy am I glad I asked for that meeting.
The company vision was exciting and the product they are developing has enormous potential to transform and improve healthcare. There would be fabulous personal opportunities for me to meet and work with people famous in the medical field. This was sounding good. Wouldn’t it be super-exciting, not to mention a great career opportunity, to be part of such a venture?
But the requirements that would be expected of me included living and breathing the company, being available 24/7, and working to impossible deadlines. What would that mean for my life? For my family? What would I need to sacrifice?
Recognise your true values
This was a defining moment in clarifying my values about work and family.
As I considered this incredible vision that would be so amazing to be part of, I knew deep down that I just never could be part of this vision. And I would not take the job. I knew I could not sacrifice my family on the altar of work — no matter how exciting the vision, or how enticing the salary.
Over my 20 years working in health I hope I have helped people. Helping people is important and what I want to do. But there is no calculation that can estimate the worth of one life over another and the lives already entrusted to me must come first, because nobody else in the whole world can stand in for me. And the work I do must be in the service of my family, and be to their benefit. Work must not and can not proceed at the detriment of those closest to me.
So wherever I end up working, and however my career progresses, I’ll make sure I’ll be working in line with my values. That means I’ll make sure to be working for my family — not despite my family. And that’s the way it should be, for me.
How have you uncovered your own values around work and family?