More Answers... (7/27/25 Newsletter): Values-Based Leadership - Is it a Myth?

Hi Everyone,

Here's the blog version of the Sunday Evening "More Answers..." to get a friendly boost to setup your work week! 

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What is "Values-Based Leadership?"

Simply put: values-based leadership is a leadership style where you lead based on core values that starts from a moral and ethical basis (Copeland, 2014). 

It's easy to forget how much research is focused on various business topics, including what it takes to run the best, brightest, boldest, and most successful organizations. Past scholars have often made the research difficult to understand at best or un-implementable (if that is a word) at worst.

That said, there was a surge in studying this leadership style soon after the early 2000s saw egregious issues from Enron and various other organizations where top leadership were either knowingly conducting themselves in an unethical (and unlawful) way, or turning a blind eye-- later considered "willful blindness"-- while those on a CEO or other C-level staff (and downward) would conduct themselves in an unethical and at times unlawful way.

More recent studies have focused on typical primary behaviors (or "forms" of values-based leadership) such as leadership styles observed as authentic, ethical, and servant-based (Chang et al., 2021).

[OK, I'm done with the geeky business researcher schtick - thank you for indulging!]

But really, how many of us think values-based leadership is something worth talking about today? Because I'll say this: whether you believe in it or not, the evidence about its impact on an organization, department, and team is irrefutable: good humans perform better and produce excellence in their results when values-based leadership is in play. 

Does "Values-Based Leadership" Make a Difference?

Well, let's talk about what it looks like and you can decide for yourself:

• Places people first; the leader is there to remove obstacles and enable employees to grow and develop and do their best.
• Demonstrates a moral and ethical aptitude; leads by example in how they conduct themselves: excellence in communication and compassionate; excellence in earning trust and respect; excellence in mobilizing and employees; excellence in holding employees accountable.
• Cares deeply about employee success as the root of business success.

A values-based leader may say things like:

• "When you do well, we all do well, so we're looking into ways to make your work easier and more efficient..."
• "We're interested in benchmarking how we're doing and whether you feel you can succeed here so we can gain insights for how to do better-- we're hoping you'll engage with our employee survey to help us get started." 

AND you believe the leader because the leader has shown behaviors of servant leadership: prioritizes growth and well-being of employees, enables a successful environment, enables  Want more information on Values-Based Leadership? Click here. 

So YES, it makes a difference. Unfortunately, the term "values" can sound squishy, subjective, imaginatory, or soft, Equally unfortunate, it takes a natural-born values-based leader to conduct themselves with values-based leadership behaviors, but that doesn't mean it's impossible to adopt such behaviors.

How Does Values-Based Leadership Impact an Organization? And What Does It Look Like?

Aside from the literature (actual hardcore research that will provide evidence of how values-based leadership impacts an organization), here's what I've repeatedly seen in organizations with just a small bit of values-based leadership:

1. Enables stable, predictable, solid-ground behaviors (which builds trust and commitment)

Employees see and feel more than they realize, and way way more than most leaders realize. Values-based leadership enables a level of stability, trust, respect, and solid ground that the right decision, the right move, the right way of doing work will be done-- and when I say "right," I mean in an ethical, lawful, people-centered way. It's not about being perfect, it's not about coddling employees, and it's not about never losing patients or never behaving badly. But it IS about a level of predictable goodness in the behavior of humans such that they are not constantly looking out for themselves, constantly worried about unethical decisions, constantly worried about whether they can match their values with the organizational values.

2. Produces faster, better decisions with easier recovery if the decisions bring unexpected outcomes.

When leaders and teams are aligned around a clear set of values, decisions don’t stall in fear or politics or analysis paralysis (which typically occurs when people anticipate all the reasons a leader will shut down an idea). 

People know how to weigh the tradeoffs, they know the priority for good vs excellence, and they know how to move ahead without requiring 10+ layers of approvals.

They also recover quickly if the decisions didn't work as expected AND they'll be more motivated to work through the hard times when those arise.

3. Attracts and retains the right talent: the focus is on bringing out the best in others with accountability.

Who doesn't want to feel proud of who they work with and work for? We all want leaders we can look up to, leaders we can learn from, leaders who expect the best with a health margin for error so we can learn from mistakes. They want to be sure we aren't ALWAYS making mistakes, but they've earned a level of respect from us such that if we make a mistake, we won't repeat it. We don't want to-- not because of fear, but because we don't want to let ourselves down, our team down, or our leaders down.

When you hire competent values-based team members ready to grow and develop and perform their best while offering trust and respect to others in an ethical way, the best can happen in an organization.

When you learn how values-based leadership impacts the hire-and-retention equation, it makes for a strong, competitive, high performing organization in perpetuity.

4. Creates an ethical culture able to ask questions and report concerns.

This is one of the biggest issues these days, where employees see, know, or gut-feel that something is wrong and they cannot or will not speak up about it. OR, they do speak up about it, and it doesn't get much farther than one layer up. Values-based leadership creates a climate and leads by example where ethics aren’t performative—they’re real. And if someone isn't sure about something, they can ask.

If this sounds refreshing and impossible to believe, it means you aren't in (or perhaps never saw) values-based leadership in play. There ARE companies that are known for this, though, and there ARE ways to find them.

How Can I Determine Which Companies Have Values-Based Leadership?

1. As with all companies, do your homework.

Take a look at ANY job description and see how well it is crafted: 

• How much detail is provided about the organization's vision, mission, and values? 
• Is the vision related to your core values? 
• Does the mission emphasize who the customers are and HOW employees support or provide products to those customers? 
• How much information is provided about employee support and employee development?
• Go deep on learning about the CEO and as many leaders as you can: Google, LinkedIn, Glassdoor, etc. 
• Go deep on what current employees are saying (be be wary of past employees as well as highly subjective Glassdoor or Indeed reviews that sound personal, such as, "My manager just didn't like me." You're looking for feedback that will be helpful for you, not someone who is demonstrating a one-sided issue).
• Find a stress point, bad news moment, lay-off, or other crisis situation and how the organization responded to it. Did they publicly share-- with remorse-- the need to lay off a percentage of their workforce, and did they endorse those who they had to lay off as a matter of backing their decision? Have they offered the best possible package for each employee impacted? What are employees saying about their treatment during a layoff? (note: here, too, is important to decipher between employees who are understandably upset from how the lay off was handled; the key differentiator is whether the employees experienced a lay off where they were told it was a strategic decision and received a package to help them with their next step, or was treated as how Meta laid off employees Dec '24 - Jan '25 layoffs, or how DOGE laid off government employees Feb - May '25). 

2. Look for B Corps and those active in Social Responsibility programs

• B Corps are companies formally certified by B Labs Global as for-profit companies focused on the highest standards for ethics, environment, accountability for ALL stakeholders, and social impact.
• Seek companies that remain steadfast in their Social Responsibility and Environmental, Social & Governance (ES&G) programs. 
• Values-based leadership is a way of life; companies that believe in it will invest in it and talk about it. There are various direct ways to determine how an organization leads by focusing on organizational behaviors and programs reflective of their culture and leadership.

Here's the worst-kept secret for those of us in the business of making businesses work as best as they can (or recover and reset so they can do much better): "Best of..." lists are campaigns, and as with all campaigns, the results are often based on how well you understand the campaign.

We all know dozens of toxic companies that make "The Best Places to Work" list, and it's often because of one or two strong factors, like: high salaries, great benefits, etc. What they often do not factor in are various cultural aspects like speaking up when there's an issue, feeling respected and valued, and able to do my best work within an appropriate amount of time.

You can find a lot of unfiltered information these days; it's YOUR job to do the filtering based on what you are looking for. No need to go to lists where companies have to submit data and apply.

4. Ask Values-Based Interview Questions

Values-based leadership is a way of life; companies that believe in it will invest in it, talk about it, and view it as a strength and advantage.

There are various direct ways to determine how an organization leads by focusing on organizational behaviors and programs reflective of their culture and leadership. Ask these questions during your interviews:

BOOSTER FOR YOUR WEEK!!! 

Learn the name Cynt Marshall,
then make her a role model (too)... 

I was doing my usual research as I wrote this week's newsletter, and in searching for great examples re: values-based leadership, I came across the usuals... which means no one I can relate to, which also means no one most of my followers can relate to. 

Every leader talking about values-based leadership came from ivy leagues and studied with the greatest mentors, or came from ivy leagues and grew upward in large companies because of strong networks... (the usuals).

Then I came across the Great Places to Work youtube page, and landed on the episode about Cynt Marshall.

And I fell in love in a starry-eyed "wow, she's AMAZING" kind of way.

We rarely hear of highly successful CEOs who aren't obnoxious, audacious, brazen, difficult, controversial... they just don't make for good TV, as the saying goes. We also rarely hear of the highly successful CEO who doesn't look or sound like what most conjure in their heads when most imagine a highly successful CEO.

As a middle aged woman with strong ethnic roots, even *I* have found myself conjuring the very image I've been bombarded with all my life about what a "successful CEO" looks like-- and the image in my head is not someone who looks like me... a stark reminder that even those who work so closely with C-levels and certain boards in need of transformation can easily lose sight of what it takes to break self-limiting beliefs of what leaders look like.

And the BEST leaders lead with a values-based style (irrefutable; research is below and cited above).

Enter Cynt Marshall, who is FOR SURE became another role model of mine TODAY.

President: Check (AT&T premiered on the Fortune 100 list, 2017)
CEO: Check (Dallas Mavericks; reset the culture and performance)
(Hello.)

This week's newsletter clip is about Cynt Marshall. It explores values-based leadership, and wowsah... yeah. She's the real deal.

In the meantime, I'm almost at episode 30, which will be a big milestone for me-- thank you for your support!

And remember, if you have a business challenge or workplace issue—Ask Christa! 

See you next week!!!

With kindness,
Christa

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