What we stand for
I read Roy Spence "it's not what you sell it's what you stand" and I have been able to learn a few things for myself about purpose. Standing your ground irrespective of what others might think. With the get rich attitude of young people nowadays its easy to be sway to taking the short cut. As a young man trying to set up a business in Nigeria where bribery and corruption hold sway, its hard not to sometime think of a short cut to getting things done.
Am recommending this book to every young person who want to be successful doing the right thing.
These are some of the book highlights
I have included a download link at the bottom so you can have a glimpse at the book.
From
the beginning, instinct told us that what a company stands for is as important
as what it sells
The
visionary companies had a set of core values that were unchanging and a core
purpose that fuelled everything the organization did
Purpose
isn’t everything, but it trumps everything else. Sure, every organization must
also have strong leadership, management, succession planning, execution,
strategy and tactics, innovation, and more, but it all has to start with a
purpose. That is the hinge that everything else hangs upon.
The
textbook definition of purpose is: The object toward which one strives or for
which something exists. Without a purpose, what are you striving for? What are
you resolved to accomplish? If you have no answer to these fundamental
questions, your business (and your life) may be a real struggle.
The
power of purpose is not a marketing idea or a sales idea. It’s a company idea.
Purpose drives an entire organization and it answers why the brand exists.
—Jim
Stengel, former global marketing officer of Procter & Gamble (P&G)
PURPOSE DRIVES
EVERYTHING
With
a purpose in place, decision making becomes easier. You can look at an
opportunity or a challenge and ask yourself, “Is this the right thing to do
given our purpose? Does this further our cause?”
If
it does, you do it. If it doesn’t, you don’t. If it’s proof to your purpose,
embrace it. If it violates your purpose, kick it out on its ass.
They
look at the world through the lens of their purpose. If a move is relevant to
their purpose, they make it. If not, they don’t.
For
example, if a decision comes to the table and it violates the core purpose of
Southwest Airlines’ ability to keep costs down and fares low, it’s thrown out.
If a piece of automotive technology is presented to BMW that does not support
the core purpose of enabling people to experience the joy of driving, they
discard it. If some idea is put forward at John Deere that might compromise
their quality, commitment, innovation, or integrity, it will be passed over. If
any com- promise on design is put on the table at Kohler, it is ignored. If a
new policy at Norwegian Cruise Lines that would inhibit their passengers’ right
to go their own way is run up the flagpole, it is tossed out. If any new
practice would cast doubt on the integrity of the game of golf, the PGA Tour
would immediately nix it.
In
short, leaders driven to fulfill a purpose will make decisions to ensure that
the purpose is never violated.
Purpose
should drive what’s on your personal to-do list, what’s on the R&D list,
and what’s on your mind as you assess the overall performance of the
organization. Hiring and firing should be based on alliance with the purpose.
Purpose should drive everything from the philosophical foundations of the
company
As
Aristotle said: “Where your talents and the needs of the world cross, there
lies your calling.” Your purpose, as it was.
Most purpose-based leaders and
organizations understand the needs of the world instinctively. Answering those
needs is the path to high performance.
Sam Walton knew that people in rural areas were sick
of paying high prices for average goods. They needed a retailer they could
trust to deliver low prices every day on quality goods that help make life a
little better.
Herb Kelleher knew the 85 percent of the market that
hadn’t flown probably wanted to—they just needed someone to make it affordable
for them.
Charles Schwab knew that individual investors were
sick of get- ting ripped off by traditional Wall Street brokerage firms. People
needed a brokerage firm that was on their side.
John Deere knew that the farmers who were having a
hard time plowing through the tough prairie soil of the Midwest would
appreciate a better performing plow that they could trust to get the job done.
Phil Knight and Bill Bowerman (Nike) believed that
“if you have a body, you’re an athlete.” They knew that if they outfitted indi-
viduals with innovative gear and inspired them with a battle cry, a new
generation of athletes would emerge around the world.
Howard Schultz (Starbucks) knew that people would
probably appreciate a third place to spend time and enjoy a really good cup of
coffee if they had it.
A story from Jim Stengel, which
demonstrates how purpose can unleash innovative thinking in an organization.
Jim believed that Pampers was more than just a diaper that prevents wetness. As
he expresses it, “We’re talking about babies and mothers and birth and life.
Shouldn’t we as a company have a higher aspiration other than to just keep the
bottom dry?” He describes the powerful transformation that happened when
Pampers began to earnestly explore how they could do more than “just keep the
bottom dry”:
We began thinking about our product experience
differently. We identified “sound sleep” as a key to healthy baby development.
We began asking questions like what can Pampers’ role be in helping babies have
deep, healthy sleep so they can wake up with energy, with rejuvenation and
better brain development? We did clinical studies in that area. We learned that
mothers around the world care about one another. One thing led to another and
now we have a partnership with UNICEF in over 40 countries; when a mom buys a
bag of Pampers, we donate one vaccination delivered through UNICEF. And now,
ten years later, the brand has doubled in size. It’s one of the leading brands
in the world and has become P&G’s first $8 billion brand.
PURPOSE RECRUITS PASSIONATE
PEOPLE
“Don’t ever take a job—join a crusade! Find a cause
that you can believe in and give yourself to it completely.”
—Colleen Barrett, retired president
of Southwest Airlines
On the flip side, when applicants
have been drawn to your organization because of your purpose, you’ve just added
a level of energy and passion necessary to create a high-performing company.
PURPOSE BRINGS ENERGY AND
VITALITY TO THE WORK AT HAND
What man actually needs is not a tensionless state,
but rather the striving and struggling for some goal worthy of him. What he
needs is not the discharge of tension at any cost, but the call of a potential
meaning waiting to be fulfilled by him.
—Viktor Frankl, Man’s Search for
Meaning
We all know individuals who speak
about their work with great joy and intensity—it’s a major source of their
fulfillment in life. These are the people who look forward to Monday mornings
as much as most people look forward to Friday afternoons. For others, work is a
necessary evil—something to be endured, a source of fatigue and complaints.
What makes the difference? Is the
joyful experience a by-product of some happy gene that most of us were born
without? Or do these people—the happy ones—lead or work for a company with a
purpose that ignites their passion, their dedication, and their joy?
Once the purpose is established,
it’s important to use it as a screening tool in your organization’s recruiting
process. Bringing someone on board who is not interested in your purpose or
doesn’t believe in it can, at best, demoralize the people around them and, at
worst, can begin to derail the purpose altogether (if they’re high enough in
the organization).
It is more important to know who you are than where you are going,
for where you are going will change as the world around you changes. Leaders
die, products become obsolete, markets change, new technologies emerge, and
management fads come and go, hut core ideology in a great company endures as a
source of guidance and inspiration.
Call a Mars Group. It
works like this: Imagine that you've been asked to re-create the very best
attributes of your organization on another planet but you have seats on the
rocket ship for only five to seven people. Whom should you send? Most likely,
you'll choose the people who have a gut-level understanding of your core
values, the highest level of credibility with their peers, and the highest
levels of competence.
Purpose Principles
Purpose drives everything. It will drive all major
decision making and be- come the determining factor in how you allocate
resources, hire employees, plan for the future, and judge your success.
Purpose is a path to high
performance. It
fulfills a deep-seated need that people have and will drive preference for your
company.
Purpose fosters visionary ideas
and meaningful innovation. It provides the mo- tivation and direction necessary to create
meaningful innovation.
Purpose moves mountains. It can rally the troops to
overcome seemingly in- surmountable odds.
Purpose will hold you steady in
a turbulent marketplace. It will see you through when times get tough and the road seems
unclear.
Purpose injects your brand with
a healthy dose of reality. It is not something you can fake. It’s genuine. It’s real. And
it’s something that your customers honestly appreciate about you.
Purpose recruits passionate
people. It
will make your organization more at- tractive to value-based, passionate
people.
Purpose brings energy and
vitality to the work at hand. It provides meaningful and sustainable motivation for
employees.
Purpose contributes to a life
well lived. Work
is no longer a 9-to-5 job to be endured but a meaningful source of fulfillment
and satisfaction.
0 comments:
Post a Comment
Please tell us what you fill about this post