Core Values and Teens

One of the goals for our highschool program is to walk them through all sorts of typically adult topics that happen in business, life, careers...  Creating and describing core values for their team is a huge one.  Most of the teen-focused core values I could find online were set by adults for teens -- these are the core values teens should have, these are the core values that our teen-focused program has, etc.

But understanding how important a group/tribe/team's core values is will be even more important in the future as companies involve more activities across teams, both in person and virtually.

Here are some posts about implementing Tribal Leadership ideas with teens:
http://www.linkedin.com/groups/Implementing-Tribal-Leadership-Teens-2355813.S.57487589

In our highschool team, we have some well-defined core values that were generated by the students in reaction to other students leaving the team.  It made the core stronger.  Now, the challenge is to collect those core values into something cohesive, repeatable (and reinforceable), and tranferable not only to new team members but to mentors as well.

We started out with a 4 minute writing exercise (mentors and students) -- they started by the core values they lived by (though they felt that was too personal to present first), then words to say what type of team/organization they would be proud to be part of -- and then what sets our team/organization apart from other teams.

Here's the list -- primarily teen-driven...

Next step:  Put all those core values on a board with post-its and play with combining them, moving them around for a few weeks to get it down to something that makes sense...

What words describe the type of a team would you be proud to be a part of?  

• Graciously professional

• Help other teams

• Coopertition

• Innovative

• Approachable

• Intelligent people

• Capable of showing respect

• Well oiled

• Everybody is growing

• Fun

• Supportive of each other

• Feeling of community

• Equal value, different experience

• Ready to try

• Team building

• Known about

What words set our team apart from other teams -- when you tell people who we are compared to other local teams, what makes us us?

• Community based

• No one is second class

• Group-led team

• More enjoyment of outreach

• Learning by doing – all of us

• Everybody is a leader (nudger)

• Everybody may do everything

What are 4 or 5 key core values YOU live by?

• Helping people learn

• Treat everyone the same

• Be helpful when you can

• Fun!! Work

• Never stop learning

• Learning by doing

• Honest

• Hopefully optimistic

• Risk taking

• Inviting help from everyone

• Raising the bar

• Fail once, fail better