Marc Avanzo: Putting work where your values are
Marc Avanzo, 36, is a Marseille-born electrical engineer with a passion for music, improvisation and composing with around 5 instruments (not at the same time, of course). He accrued extensive experience in management and marketing working with Telecommunications companies in the UK, France and the Netherlands, both with medium and large-sized companies such as Completel, AT&T, and Universal. An MBA at INSEAD in Fontainbleau followed, and then he and two friends worked on a start up project that provided kind of multimedia e-book for music and musicians, coupled with internet music services, an enterprise which he described as a ‘total failure’. Dusting himself off he then began a consultancy in Management and Marketing, working for big and small companies and NGOs, from Foundation Nicolas Hulot to Kodak. Two years ago he boldly took a step in his career that is more aligned with his values, and quite explicitly so. He is a Values Based Leadership coach and consultant. He recently shared his thoughts on what led him to blazing a career in Values-Based Leadership and what it means to him and to the people he’s worked with.
EBBF: How did you get involved with Values Based Leadership?
Marc: Well, after my work consulting with businesses and NGOs I realized basically that the companies have the means but they don’t have the values and the NGOs have the values but don’t have the means. And even when they do have money, they don’t always know how to use it efficiently, and transpose their vision and values into concrete, effective and consistent steps.
NGOs have an additional challenge of bringing their own practices in line with their values. One NGO I worked for sponsored a national media campaign to promote resource conservation, stop leaking taps, separate trash, etc. But they themselves had leaky taps, and didn’t recycle their paper in their office! I got yelled at when I called their attention to this; there was a clear discrepancy between their values and vision and the way they were expressing them, exactly like in many companies.
Also, I decided to make this change in my career because I wanted to give meaning to my own work, to my own life. I personally don’t see the value of earning lots of money if it is at others’ expense. It’s not earning money that I enjoy. I enjoy helping others develop. Seeing someone develop is the utmost joy I can have.
- Workshop on Values Based Leadership for AIESEC in Paris
I see that business, by focusing exclusively on short-term goals, is often denying people’s diversity and unity. This is actually destructive for society. Business is immensely constructive in the amount of wealth and technology being created, but tends to be destructive in social and environmental terms. Today’s business is based on a particular culture of fierce competition, where short-term goals take precedence over the long-term. The very structure of corporations with shareholders who expect maximized profits as quickly as possible is destructive towards small but long lasting evolutions. And we’re victims of our technical efficiency. We’re in a system in which we have no time for thinking about ourselves and about each other, and thus we’re destroying the social fabric. So with this culture there is no way out, except with a change of values, a change of paradigm.
Adam Smith, who is considered the father of liberal economics, introduced the rules of capitalism; he stemmed from a very religious family and for him it was obvious that values had somehow to be there if the system were to function correctly. The “invisible hand” that would ultimately balance the exchanges if every one is pursuing their own interest, can only work when supported by basic values of respect, trust and fairness We’ve completely forgotten this; we have only remembered the “invisible hand” technical description, thus depriving it from its own meaning.
I discussed once with an expert in global environmental issues and we were talking about some new technology that was being developed that would significantly reduce our consumption of energy. She said that this technology would not be our savior. ‘Why?’ I asked. She answered “because we will use whatever energy we save for some other thing that in their turn consume some more energy”. So the point is that unless there is a change of values there will be no lasting change. Without this change of culture, we are bound to experience increasing environmental problems.
You know, what is needed isn’t just a small tweak in the company. What is needed is a cultural change, a change in values, a change in vision, a change in the way of thinking about and of doing things. So as a management consultant you realize that what you are doing when addressing only “technical” issues is basically useless from a long-term perspective (although it will surely help in the short-term).
And it is the values that enables these changes to be long-lasting. Values are what give meaning to people’s work. Without values people feel a sense of meaningless at work, they become depressed, which in turn leads to poor work performance. So becoming aware of the importance of values and learning how to implement them in the workplace is in the best interest of the individuals, of the company, and of society in general.
Values are not just a new trend. I’ve realized that despite the fact that most of us have deep constructive values inside, very few people dare to express them fully at work, because they think that the values they cherish go against current business culture. My task is to make them aware that they have something beautiful inside, and that it is their duty to reveal this beauty for their own sake and for society.
- Worksheet from VBL workshop
EBBF: What do you mean that values aren’t something new?
Marc: The Western world, and more particularly, the supposedly ‘scientific’ approach of business in the west where we are living, bases everything on a set of values, values that are both conscious and unconscious. It values the here and now, the concrete, and a fragmented approach to understanding and controlling things. These values are very efficient for producing short-term results, which explains why western society has managed to experience such rapid scientific development in recent decades.
However, values and visions that are for the long-run—things that are intangible: people, feelings, aspirations—are not on the radar of day to day business; they are considered as “soft” unimportant issues in the Western world. However, although we cannot see or touch these dimensions, they are constantly acting upon us, and if we ignore them and act against them, we simply feel bad sometimes without even understanding why. For instance, some employees evolving in a harsh competitive and hierarchical internal culture might end up feeling extremely stressed and helpless, thinking that they have to adapt to a “harsh reality”, while their business reality should also take their aspirations, needs and strengths into account simply to be more creative and efficient.
Today’s business reality is very complex and in constant evolution…the only way to outperform is to use everybody’s abilities, viewpoints and strength, even if they might not appear useful at first. Empowering employees and leveraging on their creativity is the answer to our new competitive reality. I believe that we are creatures that find great reward in learning and developing ourselves, so empowerment is a win/win solution for both the employee and the company.
EBBF: Could you help me get an idea of what your work with others looks like, I mean how do you help people develop values-based leadership?
Marc: Well, one thing I try to do is working with people from their own strengths, from their own values. Ok, there are certain ones I take for granted—love, justice, trust and respect—these are values that are found in all the religions. Then we take these values, along with others that the participants come up with, and we work on them on three different levels: how these values affect them personally; then on an interpersonal level, how the way that you express your values affects others such as family and colleagues; and finally how your interactions with others have an effect on society and your company.
While I don’t tell people what are good and what are bad values, people don’t usually come up with crazy, deeply egocentric ones. I don’t preach to anybody but open the space for people to have their own reflection and make their own decisions. And by interacting with each other, the participants encourage one another and realize that what they carry inside is common to many other people.
The process is interesting, at first business people aren’t used to looking at such intangible subjects and it takes them some time to adjust. But given time and space for introspection on these important dimensions, they discover that these issues are a powerful tool for change. This training can be either used as a short-term ‘trigger’ for action, or more as a long-term form of coaching.
EBBF: Give me an example of an exercise you do.
Marc: Well, we start by asking ‘For you, what is a human being?’ This brings people out of the ‘normal’ business concerns, and gets them to look at a fundamental issue: your customers, colleagues, employees, outsourcers, they are all human beings. If you look at a customer only as an impersonal entity that is there to receive your product or service providing you with money in return, you’ll treat them differently than when you look at them as fellow human beings.
Also, to explore these issues we look at concepts from the fields of philosophy, psychology, emotional intelligence and personal development, as well as leadership and management theories.
EBBF: There is an often heard remark about this kind of work—that it is easy to make list of constructive values, but that the real important and difficult issue is the implementation. This is probably a particularly concern of yours in a line of work where your explicit aim is to translate values into actions. Any thoughts?
Marc: Yes, it is a challenge. Many people understand what constructive values are. But no one knows how to put those into practice. For example, one of the big pushes in leadership today is service-oriented leadership. People are increasingly aware that big egos are destructive since they devour resources and destroy the social capital. And it is encouraging to see all the different theories and camps converging on this idea of servant leadership. So everyone knows this, but what is next? In our trainings we start with what it means to be a servant leader and examine what it is to put this concept into practice in different situations.
One thing we do during the training/coaching period is that we ask the participants to behave differently according to what they are learning, be it doing small or big things, and then to come back and share. (Or not share, if they want to keep what they did private.) One man once told me after having studied the concept of servant-leadership, “Look, I don’t feel like being a servant leader at work right now, but I will do it with my family. I’m going to visit an aunt of mine who annoys me to no end and I’m going to spend some quality time with her.” And he did just that. When he came back the next week he said: “You know, this was the first time that I didn’t feel annoyed with her, because I was visiting her with a sense of purpose. I visited to serve”. So I try to help people become aware of how they feel when they do this kind of things. So the training is about giving everyone a common knowledge, a common experience, a common language, which they can all relate to, and then use as a basis later in their efforts to bring meaning to their work, and improve the life of their companies.
EBBF: You live in a pretty secular country. Do people ever ask you about the relationship between the values you talk about, the concept of purpose in life, and spirituality or religion?
Marc: I see religion as one source of values. Love, respect, unity, etc.—these are all embedded in the spiritual teachings of all the religions I know. But I also believe that the values are within ourselves, and that in a way religions are here to make these values evident and apparent for everyone. I think it is especially crucial to talk about the importance of religion here in France, where secularism and religion denial is a religion in itself. True religion is a tremendous source of vision and of energy, when it remains true to its core values, and isn’t implemented in an exclusive manner, (leading some believers to see themselves as the only “saved” ones, and the rest of the world as lost souls). The basis of true religion is love and unity for all mankind, it is in this sense a powerful and positive force for change.
