Many industries, from business to health services, often complain about a lack of time and money. Imagine if conflicts were minimized and burnout wasn't wounding our workforce. The savings in time, resources, and human capital would be immense.

In today's work environment, many conflicts, grievances and issues requiring formal discipline aren't due to a lack of competency. Instead, they're often rooted in values-based issues. While performance and skill deficiencies are easy to spot, it's the misalignment of values that truly disrupts teams and organizations.

Understanding Values-Based Conflicts

Conflicts often arise from choices that reflect personal values, not skills. Consider these scenarios:

• Disrespectful communication alienates colleagues.
• Failing to follow through on commitments, undermining trust.
• Consistently being late signalling a lack of respect for others' time.
• Avoiding accountability by blaming others for mistakes.
• Refusing to collaborate, stifling team progress.

These behaviours highlight a deeper issue—a misalignment with core values like respect, integrity, and collaboration.

The Four Ds of Values Violations

When values are violated, the effects are profound. Employees experience:

1. Disconcerting – Initial discomfort when values are breached.
2. Disappointing – Growing sense of letdown when issues aren't addressed.
3. Disillusioning – Loss of faith in the organization over time.
4. Demoralizing – Deep emotional toll, leading to disengagement and burnout.

The Solution: Fixing the Gate

To reduce conflicts and prevent burnout, organizations need to rethink hiring. It's not just about skills—it's about values. "Fixing the gate" means:

• Filtering for Competencies, Hiring for Values: Ensure candidates align with organizational values such as respect, integrity, accountability, and collaboration. This will ensure a more positive, meaningful and harmonious work environment.

• Empowering Values Champions: Leaders must be trained to uphold and promote these values, acting as connectors, directors and protectors of a preferred values-driven culture.

The Role of Leaders as Values Champions

Leaders set the tone for workplace culture. When they embody organizational values, they create a safe and productive environment. This leadership approach:

• Aligns their attitude, actions and interactions with guiding values.
• Supports all team members to know and understand the core values.
• Builds capability of staff to align behaviour with company values in their work.
• Prevents conflicts from becoming destructive by adhering to a values-based process for navigating differences.
• Recognizes and reinforces behaviours that align with organizational values.
• Calls out and corrects behaviours that are misaligned with preferred values-based actions.

Conclusion: Investing in a Values-Driven Culture

By prioritizing values alignment, organizations can effectively address conflicts and enhance work environments. This leads to better service quality and a more resilient workforce. By fixing the gate and empowering leaders as values champions, businesses can foster a preferred culture that embodies the core guiding values, ensuring long-term success and employee well-being.

While many of us understand the importance of aligning values to reduce conflict and burnout, few have been equipped with the skills and knowledge to implement these strategies effectively. At Brivia, we've spent decades developing and refining the necessary knowledge and strategies required for this part of the journey. If you're looking for guidance, we encourage you to reach out. We love to help.

Stephen de Groot is President and CoFounder at Brivia. He is the author of Responsive Leadership (SAGE, 2016) and Getting to Better: A New Model for Elevating Human Potential at Work and in Life (Fall, 2025).

To learn more about Stephen, his work and the Brivia approach click here