Coaching practices for Core Values List

Describe almost anything you are working through and IX Coach finds the practices whose real-world fit is closest. For Core Values List, these are the strongest matches in the current practice library.

Does this sound like the set of challenges you might be facing?

• If you ask me what I value I’ll say family, health, honesty, growth
• I’ve got a short list of values but they’re all just sitting there as equals, and the second two of them collide in real life
• We’ve got nice-sounding values up on the wall and the website, but they do nothing in the room when a real hiring or judgment call is on the table
• If someone asked me what I actually care about, I’m not sure I could answer honestly
• I pour everything into one part of my life

Practices that may help

1. The forced-rank sort
   Write your top 20 candidate values on cards, then sort them ruthlessly until you have a ranked top five.
   Values Card Sort
2. Rank your top values
   Force a strict order among your finalists so conflicts resolve in advance.
   Values Clarification, Made Practical
3. Values Clarification, Made Practical
   Values clarification is the work of naming what matters most to you, sorting the genuine priorities from the inherited ones, and using them to guide real choices. The methods — card sorts, ranking, value-consistent action — draw heavily on values work in acceptance-and-commitment therapy (ACT), which has clinical support; living in line with your values correlates with wellbeing in observational research.
4. Make core values operational, not decorative
   Use core values in hiring, recognition, and decision-making — not just on the website.
   The Rockefeller Habits: Scaling Up with Rhythm and Focus
5. Values clarification: what matters most to you?
   Identify 3–5 core values — not what you should value, but what actually matters when life is stripped back.
   Values-Based Action (ACT), Made Practical
6. Values Card Sort
   A values card sort is a structured exercise — originally developed in motivational interviewing — that forces you to rank competing values by choosing between them rather than claiming you hold all of them equally. The comparison process surfaces implicit priorities that self-report alone misses. Evidence for values-clarification as a lever for behavior change is observational to clinical; the specific card-sort format has good face validity but limited direct trial data.
7. Map your values across the four life domains
   Write one core value statement for each domain — work, relationships, personal growth, leisure — before touching the bullseye.
   Values Bullseye, Made Practical
8. Values Bullseye, Made Practical
   The values bullseye, developed by Tobias Lundgren within the ACT framework, is a visual exercise in which you rate how close your current behavior is to the bullseye in four life domains — work, relationships, personal growth, and leisure. It converts abstract values into a concrete gap-analysis, making it easier to choose one committed action that moves you toward the center. The exercise is part of the established ACT toolkit; direct evidence for the instrument is limited but the underlying ACT framework has substantial support.
9. The values–behavior gap check
   Audit the last week: which of your top values did your actual decisions honor?
   Values Card Sort
10. Run a values card sort
    Sort a deck of value words into keep/maybe/discard to surface what actually matters.
    Values Clarification, Made Practical

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