Starting with why
What is your core reason for being, and where can you have a unique, positive impact upon those around you? Now, more than ever, we need good answers to those questions…
But how do we decide upon and create our sense of purpose? Decide upon our priorities? And actually deliver upon them?
Individual purpose is the bigger ‘why’ behind our goals. It motivates us, bringing stability in the midst of uncertainty – and who doesn’t need that right now?! In his book so named, Simon Sinek advocates ‘Start with Why?’. He argues that lots of people and companies know what they are doing, many understand how they are doing it, but fewer still understand and can articulate why they are doing it, their key purpose, their ‘North Star’. Understanding purpose, he argues, is why most really successful companies are so successful, and this translates to successful leaders. His Golden Circle concept, with Why at the centre, followed by the How and then the What has been much written and talked about, for understandable reasons.
A recent McKinsey report (April 2020) stated that 89% of managers and front line employees at companies care about having a purpose, and yet only 42% felt their organisations purpose statements drive impact. Translating the why into the how and what is key for it to be truly meaningful. Reflecting upon our purpose is important personal work as a leader, and perhaps the Easter bank holiday weekend will give an opportunity to reflect upon and refine what we already have, or to start this work? This deep reflection upon our identity and what we really stand for may lead to material changes in our goals and actions. When we are ‘on purpose’ we feel a deep state of ‘aliveness’.
The first step is deep self-appraisal, determining the values we hold dear, and there are a number of exercises to help us to that, basically involving choosing just 2/3 values that really mean something to us so we can determine how we want to BE with people around us. The next step is to reflect upon the behaviours we exhibit at our best - what are we DOing? What is it that we DO, how is it that we behave, that brings others alongside us? What are we doing when we feel most alive? And finally what is our SO WHAT or SO THAT? In other words, WHY are we BEING this way and DOING these things? What is it that drives us to BE and DO? These three stages, 1. BE, 2. DO, 3. SO THAT, bring clarity to our purpose, and can encourage us every step of the way – we can use this statement as a touch stone to check-in with all that we are doing. And it’s amazing how a personal purpose statement can often translate into both work and home. Leaders I speak to talk about how the work they do to develop their leadership skills often help them as a parent too.
Once we are clear on our purpose we can ensure we are delivering on it, firstly by regularly reminding ourselves what is driving us to do what we do, and then by reflecting upon any purpose gap that might exist and how we might bridge that gap. We need to embed our reflections, exploration, discussion, and action at the heart of all we do, and coaching can help us with that.
Reflections:
Why do I do what I do? What am I doing when I feel most alive?
What values do I want to model? What am I in service of?
Who do I wish to BE, and how do I wish to behave when I’m at my best?
How do I wish to contribute to my family, community, work or indeed society at large?
What is my purpose?
Is there a purpose gap for me currently? If so, what is one thing I could do to move towards bridging it?