Week Two: Resource Reflection
Basic Individual Values, Work Values, and the Meaning of Work (Ros, Schwartz & Surkiss): “Intrinsic work values directly express openness to change values—the pursuit of autonomy, interest, growth, and creativity in work.”
An interview candidate once asked me what my values at work were. What I stood for. I told him my favorite quote was from Conan O’Brien, who upon leaving The Tonight Show, offered: “If you work hard, and are kind, amazing things will happen.” It’s a quote that’s stuck with me, and strongly echoes my lived experience. It drives not just practical work ethic, but also values-driven cultural norms of behavior oriented towards helping others. It shapes how you show up at work, and fosters a position where everyone else feels better that you’re in the room. If you have that, you get invited into rooms you might not ever would have had access to before, which is where opportunity for growth and creativity can come from. Want to get promoted? Be the kindest person in the organization.
Cultures of Genius at Work: Organizational Mindsets Predict Cultural Norms, Trust, and Commitment (Canning, Murphy, Emerson, Chatman, Dweck & Kray): “These findings suggest that organizational mindset shapes organizational culture.”
I work in a busy newsroom, which by definition is unpredictable, reactive, and never the same day twice. Yet within it there are often calls for cultural and systemic stability. For planning and certainty. For process and structure. And while we have effectively organized ourselves around the journalistic mission of helping the world understand the news, it is often a challenge internally to balance structured long-term work with the short-term immediacy of the day’s stories. Connection to mission and getting the story right always wins, but balancing it with critical infrastructure work is often at the expense of long-term systemic change.
