Why Making Values Explicit is the Key to Stronger Teams

Teams thrive when they understand each other’s motivations, priorities, and decision-making frameworks. But in many cases, these remain implicit, leading to misalignment, inefficiencies, and frustration.

Rather than waiting for miscommunications to escalate, teams can proactively surface and discuss their values to improve collaboration. That’s where Value Cards come in–an exercise I created and have run with many teams, and that have now been used and run thousands of times across the world.

Value Cards help individuals and teams identify, articulate, and explore their values in a structured way. The exercise provides a shared language for discussing what truly matters, enabling teams to build stronger working relationships and avoid unnecessary friction.

Why Teams Struggle Without Explicit Values

Collaboration is easier when people have a shared understanding of what drives each other. However, in most workplaces, values remain unstated. Instead, people rely on assumptions, which often leads to misinterpretation and tension.

Consider this example:

• Person A values stability, consistency, and risk mitigation.
• Person B values speed, experimentation, and iteration.

If these two individuals work together without recognizing their differing values, their decisions will clash. One will see the other as reckless, while the other will view them as slow and overly cautious. Over time, this dynamic leads to frustration, misunderstandings, and decreased collaboration.

By making their values explicit, they can see the source of their differences and discuss how to work together effectively.

The Role of Value Cards in Teams

Value Cards provide a structured way to surface values and reflect on their impact.

The exercise is simple:

1. Sort Your Values – Identify what’s important to you and what isn’t.
2. Prioritize – Narrow down to your Top 5 core values.
3. Discuss & Reflect – Explore how these values shape behaviors and team dynamics.
4. Apply Insights – Adjust communication, decision-making, or team processes based on what was uncovered.

The process isn’t about forcing alignment but about recognizing differences and learning how to work with them.

How Teams Have Used Value Cards

Leadership & Decision-Making

One leadership team I worked with used Value Cards to align on their decision-making principles. They discovered that while they all valued transparency, some prioritized fairness over speed, while others valued agility over process consistency. By recognizing this tension, they adjusted their approach to making trade-offs in a way that worked for everyone.

New Team Formation

Another team going through restructuring used Value Cards to accelerate trust-building. Instead of spending months uncovering implicit priorities, they explicitly discussed their values upfront, reducing misunderstandings and improving collaboration.

Cross-Functional Teams

In many organizations, cross-functional teams struggle with different disciplines having different priorities (e.g., engineering teams optimizing for reliability vs. product teams optimizing for speed). Value Cards gave them a neutral framework for discussing these tensions productively.

What Makes the Exercise Effective?

1. Simple but powerful framework – The process is lightweight but delivers deep insights.
2. Applicable in different settings – From leadership alignment to personal reflection.
3. Encourages structured reflection – Helps individuals articulate and communicate their priorities.

Teams that have used Value Cards report:

• Faster alignment on decisions
• Clearer communication and fewer misunderstandings
• Improved ability to navigate conflicts constructively

Getting Started

Whether you’re leading a team, facilitating a retrospective, or coaching individuals, making values explicit is a practical step toward improving collaboration.

You can start using Value Cards today—either with a professionally printed deck, ready to use with no preparation, or by downloading the free DIY version to print yourself.

Or, if you prefer to print them yourself, download the DIY version by registering below.