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Have you ever stopped to think about your business values and how important they are to you in your business? They can help you decide whether or not to take on a project; help keep you motivated and focused; and values give you guidance for your business that can help keep staff and you on track.

But, what the heck do I mean by values?

Well, values are first of all, very personal to you. My values and your values are unlikely to be the same as each other because values are what we strive to live our life by; what’s important to us personally as well as in business. They are the things that stop us from taking on illegal projects or make us turn up on time for meetings.

My values for my business are:

• That we should go out of our way to make customers feel special and treat them like they’re our only client.
• That we thrive on coming up with ideas and making them happen.
• That we want to make our client’s business a success for them.
• That our staff should be happy and have fun working for Exceptional Thinking.
• That we will always be honest and communicate well with our customers and staff.

Now, my values will probably tell you something about me as a person too. They might indicate to you that I get frustrated if phones are not answered straight away or if we’re late for a customer meeting because that breaks my first value. And that if I’m not coming up with ideas occasionally and getting that light bulb feeling then I feel de-motivated.

So, what are your values for your business? Have a go at defining them for yourself. Here’s how. Think about the last time you felt really great (it doesn’t matter if you have to go back a while) and write that moment down. Then think about how you felt at the time and write these emotions down too.

Now do this for the last time you felt angry and frustrated and write down how you felt at the time.

Once you’ve got these emotions and feelings down on paper, you’ve probably got a pretty good idea of what your values are. The next step is to sum them up into short sentences like I’ve done above as a guide to how you run your business and how anyone coming into contact with your business (i.e. staff or sub-contractors) should behave if they work with you.

Looking at my values, it’s easy to see why I choose not to take on certain clients or when I’m interviewing reject certain people as they don’t share my values and I don’t want to work with them for that reason.

I also know that if I don’t experience my values on a fairly frequent basis, I tend to come off track and don’t feel as focused or as motivated as I could be. Defining your values for your business is a great exercise to do and can really help you take your business to the next level.