I teach a class for emerging leaders where one of the key things that participants do is write a mission statement. And on the way to the mission statement, they need to identify their top values. There's an exercise that I have them do that helps them with this. I give them a list of 50 values on these individual cards, and they have to sort out the ones that are the most resonant with them to come up with their, say, eight or 10 top values. It's fast and it gets us there. But you don't have to go through that course to find out what your values are. In fact, I think there's a better way, and it's something that you look at every single day.

It's your calendar. Now, we like to think of our values as the things that we say matter to us. But if you want to know what really matters, I don't need your mission statement. I need your calendar. How you spend your time is the very best and most accurate reflection of what your values really are. Now, this is not about judgment. It's not about looking at your calendar and judging yourself or me looking at your calendar and judging you. It's about noticing.

In this episode, I'm going to help you see what your calendar is quietly revealing about what you truly value, both at work and in the rest of your life. Now, this has been an enlightening exercise for me as well, because I can't just talk about it. I have to do it, too. And in fact, it was a number of years ago that I got a real awakening. Aha. Moment. When I looked, I took a very close look at how I was spending my time, and it revealed a number of things. Both the calendar, what goes in the calendar, as well as.

And you'll hear me talk about this more as we go on, what happens every day in your life that isn't necessarily calendar worthy? So, for example, when my kids were little, I put them to bed, or my husband put them to bed, but one or both of us put them to bed every night and read them a story or multiple stories every single night. Now, that didn't go in the calendar, but that was just daily practice, something I did and something that absolutely shed light on my values. So when I talk about your calendar here, we're just talking about the things that you daily engage in for. Maybe it's daily, maybe it's weekly, but the things that are the most important to you are the things that you actually spend your time on. Okay? So that is the core idea of what we're up to here is to think about your calendar not necessarily as your to do list, but as a treasure map of what your values are. Time is the most honest resource that we have. Where we spend our time is absolutely indicative of what our values are. And again, there might be some surprises along the way when you start to really examine how you're spending your time in terms of what you value.

And I don't necessarily mean negative surprises. I had some surprises. I'll reveal some of my surprises as we go along today. But even when things aren't on the calendar, they count. Again, things like kids, bedtime routines and so on. Some of the most important things in our life never show up on a meeting invite. Never show up on our Google calendar or our work calendar. Let's take a look though first at what is in the calendar both in terms of your work and your life.

Now there are meetings that you never miss. Compare that with the meetings that get canceled. Whether you're canceling them or somebody else is canceling them, it's in indicative of somebody's values, maybe both parties values. If somebody's canceling on you, let's say your boss consistently cancels your one on ones. Well that's telling you something about your boss's value. Now, maybe not necessarily the value of you per se, but of how your boss perceives the value of one on ones. Now that might be something that you would need to push back on. If you want those one on ones and that's important to you, you need to keep those on the calendar.

And so you need to be doing some advocacy on your own behalf if you want those on your calendar, if that is something that is important to you. But again, going back to the idea of meetings that are on the calendar that you never miss versus meetings that get canceled and you just sort of shrug. Standing commitments that you protect and those kinds of things could be focus time for those of you who are, you know, feeling the daily struggle of lots of different things vying for your attention. And sometimes it's the squeakiest wheel that gets the grace. The loudest demand of your time is where you give your energy to until you put up those boundaries of focus time. And you say for, you know, from 1 to 3pm I am heads down on this project. I'm not taking any calls, I'm not answering any emails and you know, that's, that's my boundary. So that would be an example of a standing commitment that you might be protecting to make sure that you get that work done.

Now this podcast would be an example of something that I never miss. And it's a standing commitment that I protect. Finding the time, carving out the time to spend dedicated time, researching, thinking about the topics and then recording the podcast and all the other pieces that go along with it. And my social media manager will be the first to tell you that sometimes that's in my calendar because she can see my calendar, sometimes it's not in my calendar, but the episodes get recorded regardless. Now when I have the time and the forethought and the capacity, what I do like to do is plan out.

Not necessarily all the topics of the podcast, but plan out. Where are the days, where are the pockets on my calendar where I know I can slot this in because then it keeps me accountable to holding that time so that I'm not in a crunch for time. So again, that would be an example of a standing commitment that gets protected. Then of course, there are the things, the mysterious things that always get time. And you don't even know where that time comes from, but that thing gets time and you maybe didn't put it on your calendar. Sometimes it feels like time gets away from you because you were spending time doing that thing.

In fact, I have an example of one of those from earlier today. The office building that I office out of is being torn down and I have to move. And it's just breaking my heart because I love this office space so much. And so I am in the throes of finding a different place to office. And it wasn't on my to do list today to look at other spaces, but it crossed my mind while I was eating lunch. And then after lunch, the very first thing I did was I went to look up this one office building that I looked at a year or more ago to see if it had any space available. And then that just led to this whole rabbit hole that I went down of looking for office space on a bunch of different aggregator sites. And before I knew it, I looked up and this was my podcast recording time. And I looked up and I was like, oh my goodness, it's almost two o' clock and I was going to be done with this by two o'. Clock.

So those mysterious things that capture our attention and get done or get, get our time. And then again, you know, the things that get rescheduled because it's important. So let's say something gets canceled or you have to cancel on somebody else and you reschedule it again. That's an indication of what value you have that you're putting on that or what one of your core values might be that you are giving to that project, that person, and so forth. So if someone saw your calendar, what would they assume about you? And let's not just have it be your work calendar. Let's have it be what happens in the evenings and the weekends as well. Now, what's not on the calendar but happens anyway, I think is equally as important in terms of your values.

Now, you might just sort of look at your work calendar and say, okay, here's work. And work happens between the hours of, let's say, 8 and 5. And these things. We could then further prioritize what gets done and then what your work values are. Then we could look outside of work at what gets done in your life, which again, may or may not be in a calendar form. And that will tell us a lot about your values. Now, again, I will. I'm going to share a handful of mine that were just, like, really, really surprising to me.

In fact, if you ask me what my values are, if you'd asked me what my values were, let's say, I don't know, five years ago, I would tell you that freedom was my number one core value. And that still is my number one core value. I'm not an entrepreneur by mistake. It is by choice that I want to be in, you know, captain of my own ship. I want to run my own business. I want to make the decisions about my work life that matter most to me. I value my freedom in my work. Now, that also extends outside of my work to other facets of my life.

Freedom is a really, really strong value for me. I would have also said learning and teaching. And I kind of see these two things as symbiotic learning and teaching. I am a lifelong learner, and so I would have absolutely said that. And I would have given you probably a half dozen other values before I got to family. Family would have been seventh or eighth on my list a few years back. Now, when it occurred to me a handful of years ago that where you spend your time is indicative or is a reflection of your values, that shifted everything for me. Now, family is right there in the top three, because when I looked at what I was specifically doing on a daily basis, a weekly basis, how I was using my discretionary time, family just kept showing up.

Now sometimes, and part of the reason I have commercial office space outside of my home is that my family eats up my headspace. And I'm constantly thinking about, you know, what needs to be in the pantry for snacks, what are we making for dinner tonight? You know, all of these things, they don't all revolve around food. But who needs a ride to baseball practice? What time is baseball practice? Who needs to be registered for which school activity or sporting event or what school activities and sporting events are on the calendar that I need to attend to? All of that could take up a lot of headspace for me. And again, part of my reasoning for not officing out of my home is, is becauseI wanted clear definition and separation of my family space and my workspace. I do not like them commingled.

I will work from home if I have to. There's a snowstorm, or if my husband's traveling for work and the dog needs attention, whatever. I will work from home. But it is not necessarily my preferred modality. Now, all of that being said, when I look at how I spend my time and how I spend some of my thoughts. That family is way up there at the top of it. Maybe not the top of the list. I'm still going to put free.

I think I'm still going to put freedom above family. But they oftentimes family is vying for the top position in my values. So again, I want to give you a handful of things in addition to the laundry list I already shared, but a handful of things that would suggest that my family and family is being a strong value to me, is near the top of the list. Definitely not seventh or eighth. Okay, from the time my kids were born, I, unless I was traveling for work or had some other commitment like a board meeting or something, I was putting my kids or involved with putting my kids to bed every single night until they said, no, mom, you can't put me to bed anymore. I mean, my two youngest are teenagers still living at home, and they don't really want to be tucked in unless something is really bad.

If they're sick or sad or something like that, yes, then maybe they want to be tucked in. But otherwise, a quick good night in passing and a quick I love you is all that they require or want from me at this particular stage of the game. But for the first, I don't know, 10 to 12 years of their lives, it was reading stories, tucking in, having this whole bedtime routine every single night clearly top value for me, again, reading the story even when I'm tired, even when I'd rather go be reading my own book. Family dinners. We sit down to dinner every single night. Unless somebody is at a sporting event or the part time job or something like that, or if I'm traveling for work or I've got a board meeting or something like that. But otherwise we sit down to dinner every night. And that would be again, a strong indication that family is one of my top values.

Now let's look at what some of the things are that maybe are not necessarily my top values, but maybe are your top values or other people's top values, things that they do every single day or on a, you know, a regular cadence. Maybe they don't make it into the calendar, but this would be an indication of what their values are. If you're somebody who does an early morning workout, or maybe it's an after work workout, but you are consistent in your workout regimen, then that would suggest that your physical health, and maybe part of that is your emotional health as well, but your physical and emotional health are top, one of your top values. And that's where again, the consistency of those workouts come in. It could be you take an evening walk. I take an evening walk almost every night, again, unless I'm not home. But I take an evening walk with my dog and it clears my head. It also gives me time to listen to podcasts or audiobooks or talk on the phone to friends and family members because those are typically the things I do.

Sometimes I listen to music and sometimes I just need to clear my headspace and I just listen to the sounds of the snow crunching under my feet right now it's winter, or the leaves rustling on the trees, if it were summer or fall, that sort of thing. But sometimes I just like the quiet and the it's not quite solitude. Cause I'm with my dog, but it's more or less solitude. Um, maybe you have Sunday rituals or other things, whether they are with family members or whether they are alone. But the key idea here is that some of your values don't need calendar protection because they're non negotiable for you. So when you look at what those non negotiables are, those things that you consistently do on that very regular cadence.

So for example, I'll just toss one more in. For me, I do yoga on the weekends. I usually can't fit in. My gym has yoga during the week and they just, the classes just don't typically line up with my schedule. So I will go swim and I, I don't know if I could quite put this as a value because I'm somewhat inconsistent. In an ideal world I would be swimming three mornings a week, Monday, Wednesday and Friday. But it doesn't always work out because sometimes I have an early morning client engagement and I can't get to the pool and then still make my early morning client engagement. Or if I'm traveling for work, I just obviously I sometimes I bring my swimsuit and sometimes I've. I've like done my research ahead to see if there's a pool at the hotel I'm staying at or a community pool like use.

But it just gets complicated. And so again that it just gets complicated would be an indication that it is not a high value for me. It's not one of my strongest values. Do I wish it were? Sure. If I was doing some sort of a values exercise, would I love to put my physical health at the top of the list? I would love to, but it would be total fiction. Not total fiction. I would say it ranks in the top 10, but certainly not in the top three. Okay, again, some of those things that are your non negotiables are not going to show up in your calendar.

But they are clearly indicative of what your values are. If something happens without a reminder, that's not a habit, that's an indication of your values. All right, now let's just put this on tilt for a second and look at leadership through this lens of how you're spending your time. So leaders often say they value focus, they value people, they value human development or your professional development, they value deep work. But if your boss says that they value people and then they regularly cancel your one on ones, well which one do you actually believe? What they say or what really happens? Again, what really happens is the stronger indication of the true value, not the what gets expressed. It's where you know, where does the rubber meet the road. So calendars might show back to back meetings, no thinking time, no availability whatsoever, but yet they purport to have an open door policy. As you have an open door policy and you value communication, but you're never in your open door for us to be able to communicate with you.

Okay, so again, somebody's spoken or stated values don't necessarily match up with reality. So that's where we have an opportunity to really look closely at what our calendar is saying. That is maybe a mismatch with what we might be saying aloud in terms of our values. So our calendars don't lie. How we actually spend our time don't lie. And sometimes when people do this exercise of actually looking at their calendar and looking at how they spend their time, they find some surprises. And not necessarily. I would say finding family to be one of my top values was a pleasant surprise.

It really did take me by surprise because I was like, no. Again, when I look at where I was spending my time, I was like, oh, yes, this is true. This is one of my top values. What could happen when you do this activity and you start to examine more closely how you were spending your time? Again, you can look at your work calendar and that's pretty easy to sort. But then if you look at like, well, what actually happens? Maybe you get home from work at like 5 o' clock or 6 o'clock. What happens between 6pm and 10pm when you go to bed? Maybe there's an hour or so that's food preparation and eating, whether that's by yourself, with a roommate, spouse, partner, family members, whatever. Um, so that takes up some of the time. What else happens? So you might do this activity of looking closely at how you spend your time and find that you are losing hours every day to TikTok or to Instagram reels. And you know, if you've listened to the podcast, any of my episodes on productivity, you've probably heard me say, for me, it's word puzzles, it's word games, words with friends, I play against the computer. But I could lose hours every single day if I'm not careful. And then what does that show? My values are if I am doing some sort of mindless activity. Now, again, sometimes we need a little bit of mindless activity, but when it's hours and hours every day, it's an indication that, you know, wasting time is a value.

And I will call that wasting time. I mean, absolutely, you can get a good laugh out of Instagram Reels and TikTok videos and all of that. And then it can be entertainment, and it can be entertainment. You know, give yourself 30 minutes, maybe even an hour every single day in the entertainment category. And entertainment is valuable to you, laughter is valuable to you. That's totally fine. But if you're losing multiple hours every day, that could be a surprise that you were not necessarily expecting, but it is an indication of your values. Now, does that mean you can change it? Absolutely.

You don't have to leave things as they are. If you uncover things when you look on your calendar that, or how you spend your time that negatively surprise you. So I want to just offer you three simple things to think about. A gentle recalibration, if you will, not a total overhaul. So what gets protected on your calendar and why? What gets protected on your calendar and why? What never makes it on your calendar but always happens anyway? What never makes it on your calendar but always happens anyway? And then what do you say matters that isn't actually reflected in how you spend your time? So what do you say matters to you that really isn't an accurate reflection of how you spend your time? That last one is a bit of a gotcha there. Okay.

You don't fix this by color coding your calendar harder the way you. Again, I don't want to suggest that anything's necessarily broken here. So I want you to think about this as more of a gentle recalibration, not something's broken and you need to fix it. But values are not things that go on aspirational posters, at least not for us individuals. Values are things that are visible in the choices that we make and how we spend our time.

And sometimes the goal isn't to change your calendar. It's just to finally read it honestly. Or to write down and codify the places that we are spending our time and then assess whether or not that's the place we want to be spending our time. If you want to know what you value, don't listen to yourself. Watch how you spend your time. All right, my friends, that's what I've got for you this week. Watch how you spend your time. It is an absolute indication of your values.

I will see you back here next week, same place, same time.