Sustainability for Pursuing Their Purpose

To build a purpose driven organization and to provide our team members with clarity around purpose driven work, part of our leadership responsibility is indeed to become extremely effective at connecting the most monotonous work to something monumental! OK, I realize that likely seems a bit dramatic but you get my point… The reality is that when we can verbalize a purpose that drives each of our team members, they have a shot at putting all they’ve got into even the most mundane tasks. If we’ve really listened to what they’ve shared with us and we’ve invested the time to truly observe what they’re behavior is showing us, we have a strong shot at understanding what makes them tick, that purpose that creates a spark in their eye and fills their tank when they know they’re making progress toward achieving it. Like I mentioned as we started looking at the importance of helping our team members connect with a clear purpose, it ain’t just about the pay. All that said, purpose alone won’t completely replace pay - not for the individual and not for the company either!

If you think back to the internet trolls I mentioned earlier who were barking at one of the Shorts I posted on our YouTube channel, all bent out of shape because they somehow thought I was suggesting that companies should be paying people less than they deserve, you should remember that I was adamant about how much profitability an organization stands to gain when the best employees are paid extremely well. I even mapped out how much high turnover can cost when a business owner or manager chooses to skimp on wages…

Don’t misunderstand me here: I’m not suggesting that either of these things are easy, helping our team members connect with a purpose that drives them or providing best-in-class compensation for the work they do. In fact, I’ll make the point one more time that I believe very few easy things about leading a team well. Here’s where one figurative stone will allow us to target both birds. As we’re able to make a strong and definite connection between that definite purpose that drives each individual we lead with the purpose our organization is working to achieve, our bottom line should quickly reflect the increased discretionary effort and improved productivity. When that happens, rewarding the folks responsible shouldn’t be too difficult.

Contrary to what the trolls thought, I absolutely believe that it’s in a business’s best interest to provide the best it possibly can for its employees. However, I still haven’t found those magic trees the gubermint seems to have where all the free stuff grows so that leaves most of us in a spot where we’ve actually got to be profitable to do this. I love seeing companies invest in the resources their team members need to grow in their roles. I’ve seen some organizations refuse to do this at all, some do it very sparingly, and some all but write blank checks. I’ve challenged many business owners - some from each of those scenarios - to task their team members with making a business case for whatever resource it is they’re asking for; how will it help them increase productivity while at least maintaining the existing level of safety and quality. Whether it’s a physical resource or some sort of training, they should be able to define the payback.

When we can connect a team member’s individual purpose to the one we’re working toward as an organization, the likelihood of maintaining (or even increasing) the profitability required to provide solid compensation and invest in developing them becomes sustainable. I’ve often seen employees view the company as a whole as some entity that exists and functions independently of everyone involved; it’s always been there, it has limitless resources, and it will be there indefinitely. When put in those terms, the idea is quite ridiculous, but I’d bet you can think of plenty examples of times you’ve heard comments that allude to this. By drawing the line between what our companies need to achieve and what are team members want most in their lives, we should have a foundation for showing exactly what working to reach the organizational purpose is so important, then we can work just as hard to connect that right back to what each team member values most so that’s what we’ll work through next.