Gaining Momentum – Through Purpose

First Impressions

Even though this event occurred pre COVID-19, I think it’s relevance couldn’t be more timely.   

I sat waiting to have my initial meeting with Jerry, the owner of the business, and I was observing his employees.  Their body language and expressions gave away what would be one of the big roadblocks to strong growth at his company.  Written all over their faces were empty expressions of,  “This is a place we have to be, not a place where we are inspired to be.” Observations and random conversations with employees that morning supported what my eyes told me.  Positive momentum was an elusive concept for this company.  Gaining momentum through purpose was sorely needed.

A couple of months ago I had an opportunity to work with Jerry’s company.  In conversation he described his business to me this way; “something is just not right, but I can’t put my finger on it. We can’t sustain the initiatives we start and as a result we just can’t maintain positive momentum and complete our initiatives.  I know we can be a lot better than we are.”  

 

What You See Is Not What You Get

From a quantitative viewpoint when looking at his company’s financials you would say his business was not broken. They showed his company was doing well, good free cash flow, and profitable.  Qualitatively, the visual engagement of his employees gave a starkly different picture.  The two views were extremely inconsistent with each other.  Even so, I give Jerry a lot of credit; instinctively he knew they could be so much better.  A big opportunity had presented itself. Establishing purpose would be the first step in creating an environment of positive momentum. 

The morning was about to start and the vast majority of employees arrived to work a minute or two before they were supposed to clock in.  This was not a good sign.  To me, how they arrived was even more disturbing than when they arrived. 

Their expressions were blank, lacking any visible sign of enthusiasm and their energy entering the building was neither positive or negative (which was quite fortunate). It was just empty, zombie like. One thing is for sure, if negativity were to become a problem, this company was fertile ground for negativity to take hold and grow.  

Digging in a little more with each person I spoke to, one thing became crystal clear.  No one had any idea about the “why” of what they were doing.  They just knew they had a job.  I was unable to identify a person who felt they were connected to a purpose, instead, they were empty vessels aimlessly sailing the waters of their work life.  I was confident that gaining momentum through purpose would be embraced.

 

Gaining Momentum – The Process

The steps needed to create positive momentum were discovering, establishing, clearly communicating, and managing in alignment with the purpose of the company and the work it was doing.  

• Why the work mattered.
• Why their customers mattered and needed them.
• And most importantly, why they (the employees) mattered. 

That was the task at hand and in this case it was easy to start the process because the owner really wanted more for his employees, clients and business.   So we began to work on messaging the true purpose of the company. We knew this was a crucial first step in creating momentum through purpose.

The process we used to get to their purpose on point was focusing on WHY.   Every purpose-related question we asked the group started with the word “why”.  The initial answer was just the beginning. From there we proceeded to drill down multiple levels for each initial response given.  Engagement from all was almost instant and their search for meaning was awesome and inspiring to watch.  The start of a strong new foundation was in place, fully embraced by ownership, management, and non-management employees.  

The task was completed, so we had just taken our first step in creating positive momentum.

 

Gaining Momentum – The Results

As a side-note, a month later we collectively created core values for the company.  Had we not put so much effort into landing on purpose, core-values would never have followed.  Beneficial to all was management’s decisions are now being made in alignment with their purpose and core values.  True commitment is being given to both.  What has been the result?  February was the best February the company has had.  Even more importantly, their strong commitment to their purpose and core values will be one of the key reasons they will survive these economic times.

Gaining momentum through purpose is not theory, it is the cornerstone of many successful companies whose names you know.  Afdhel Aziz recently wrote an article for Forbes which contains links to data supporting purpose’s effect on business.