It’s Not Only About Purpose, But How Deep It Goes
What’s the easiest way to deliver happiness to your team? Give them a rich and meaningful purpose
I read a lengthy LinkedIn post recently by a business thought leader. He began by saying how much admiration he has for Simon Sinek, but that respectfully he’s wrong about starting from WHY. He postulated that “happiness” is more important than purpose, and the example provided was how Tesla has such a bad culture while being a purpose-driven company.
So, I googled Tesla’s purpose to see more specifically what he was referring to. The result:
“To accelerate the world's transition to sustainable energy. Tesla was founded in 2003 by a group of engineers who wanted to prove that people didn't need to compromise to drive electric – that electric vehicles can be better, quicker and more fun to drive than gasoline cars.”
It’s true, Tesla is purpose-driven, and it’s a grand purpose, but it’s still missing something.
The movement toward purpose-driven leadership is still in its infancy. The vocabulary is still being developed. And different people have different ideas about what being purpose-driven looks like.
In truth, we could say our purpose is to make as much money as possible and that would make us a purpose-driven company. It is a purpose, it’s just not very deep or meaningful. Being purpose-driven and realizing all the amazing benefits that come with it, relates not merely to having a purpose, but how deep it goes.
Tesla’s stated purpose is amazing and awesome, and they have been and continue to be a vanguard in the movement toward a reduced carbon footprint, but their purpose does not include a value or belief related to people.
Their about page goes on to say,
“Tesla believes the faster the world stops relying on fossil fuels and moves towards a zero-emission future, the better.”
Sounds good, right? But better for who? Better in what way?
Tesla has made some very un-human-oriented decisions along the way in the interest of relentlessly pursuing their mission of accelerating the world’s transition to sustainable energy. There is also a rather cogent argument related to the heavy reliance on fossil fuels to make all those spiffy electric wiz machines.
Arguably Tesla is not a perfect company. But no company is, and having a deeper purpose is not about being perfect. Deeper purpose is about publicly stating that we aspire to something rich and meaningful. It’s saying that we may not get it right all the time, but this is what we’re about.
In thinking about this, I thought it would be a good idea to revisit my own WHY statement, for the company my wife and I run. Might as well see if I’m truly walking the talk, right? Well, here it is,
“We believe authentic wholehearted people and organizations have greater impact and the power to transform.”
Taking a balanced approach, we could define what we mean by “transform.” Transform what, or who, and in what way? The implied meaning (for us) is to transform humanity in such a way that honors all life and strives to support the greater good.
More importantly, Tesla’s goal of creating a “better” world through the acceleration toward a more carbon neutral society could imply better for people, better for nature, but in practice they have sacrificed a human centered approach in the interest of serving a far-off goal of carbon neutrality.
I would argue that you can’t have it both ways. To create a better (future) world, we need to work toward long-term goals while honoring the present. Or to state it another way, we can’t solve problems applying the same thinking that caused them. We can’t create a more egalitarian society through ruthless business practices.
Uber is another example of the failure to deepen their purpose and walk their talk.
“Movement is what we power. It’s our lifeblood. It runs through our veins. It’s what gets us out of bed each morning. It pushes us to constantly reimagine how we can move better. For you. For all the places you want to go. For all the things you want to get. For all the ways you want to earn. Across the entire world. In real time. At the incredible speed of now.”
There’s a lot of nice language on their About page. I like that they say, “For you,” — the implication being for us the customers. But what about their drivers, and staff, and government entities they’ve manipulated and muscled.
For purpose to be meaningful it needs to be deep, and we need to truly endeavor to walk the talk. And if we want to go really deep, we can strive for bettering the lives of future generations — our children’s, children’s, children’s, children’s, children’s, children — the seventh generation unborn.
But purpose doesn’t need to be grandiose to be deep. It can simply be caring — deeply caring. Let’s take a mundane example. Say a payroll service provider. Pretty necessary, not necessarily noble or exciting. But let’s say this payroll service truly honors its employees, works with its community, values doing the right thing above increasing the bottom line.
I could say flippantly that it’s not difficult, but the truth is that changing the way we do business is incredibly hard. It’s very simple though, but the commitment and dedication to keep striving for more depth is often uncertain and scary and requires us to venture to new places within ourselves.
The alternative to a truly deep purpose however, are companies like Tesla and Uber and so many others that struggle with high turnover, toxic work cultures, harassment lawsuits, and unstable income.
Clearly, venturing to a deeper place with our purpose is a much-preferred alternative. My friend and colleague Dan Salva of Will & Grail recently wrote about this same topic, applying Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs to purpose in the corporate realm.
So, back to the business thought leader who preaches the mantra of “happiness” versus “why.” What’s the easiest way to deliver happiness to your team? Give them a rich and meaningful purpose. It’s guaranteed because happiness is derived differently for different people. For some it could be pizza Fridays and Foosballs matches. For others it could be working in the solitude of a home office. For others it could be acknowledgment and respect. But a sure-fire way to deliver the most happiness across the board is a deeper purpose.
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