The Backpack

Chapter 20

Buddy glanced up toward the galley and noticed Sofia in a deep conversation with another crew member. Apparently, someone was not happy, and that someone was not Sofia. Based on the depth of Buddy's friendship with Sofia, he presumed that she would handle the situation with professionalism and kindness.

Buddy knew Sofia's core values. Her true core values. Not the overstated, undervalued, often‐ignored type of values that decorate many corporate lobbies and company letterheads around the globe.

Sofia's values were not only well thought out, they were also well lived out.

As Buddy had studied people and organizations, he'd come to believe that core values should not be a simple, boilerplate list of words, like integrity, teamwork, and honesty. No one should be in business if they don't believe in and live out integrity, teamwork, and honesty, as well as many other basic values. Buddy remembered one speaker he heard describing those as simply “permission to play”¹ values. Those were table-stakes that got you in the game.

If you choose to have a written core value, Buddy believed you should write it with a definition that made it clear and real to everyone who reads it. A core value needs to connect with people's heads and their hearts. It needs to be unique to the individual or the company.

Core values should be something that are distinctively focused on what makes us us. And, just as important, they are what will help guide us. They help us know what to say yes ...