Purpose at Our Core

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Purpose is the Foundation

Many years ago, I partnered with a good friend to start a career counseling business. Now, we were not one of the “job in a drawer” places where someone just flips through the Rolodex and says, “here’s your perfect job!” We actually worked with our clients to help identify where they would be happiest and where they would be at their element. Where they can be fulfilled and fit in. We were trying to do something of significance, because so often we ran across people who really had no clue who they were or what they were designed to do.

Purposeless Education

Case in point. One client comes in. She has gone through college, went to medical school and became a doctor. Went through residency. At the end of residency, decided she did not want to be a doctor. Went back to school and studied psychiatry. Went through residency again. Decided she did not want to be a psychiatrist. Now, 30 years old and all that time and money spent in school and programs – all that knowledge and training – and she had no idea what she wanted to be. Sitting in my office, tears and sobbing, she felt lost and that all was lost. She had no idea where to go, what to do, how to make a difference. She had no purpose.

We All Seek Purpose

She is not alone. Too many are in the same place. Not sure where to go or what to do. Many times, they made decisions on what to do or what job to take or career to pursue based on someone else’s dream. So they trudge along in a job they can’t stand, where they can’t wait for quitting time to come around or can’t wait until they hit retirement age and do something else. But even retiring doesn’t solve the problem. They still feel lost and without direction, they are just doing it from home instead of the office. There are even studies to suggest that retiring leads to an earlier death. I emphasized the suggest because it is far from conclusive. Anyway, we are lost for most of our lives without purpose.

Benefits of Purpose

Purpose gives us positive emotions that bolster us. We feel passion to drive us. We feel emotional connection. We feel satisfaction at having an impact. We feel fulfillment at adding value to someone else. Purpose does more than provide direction, it provides meaning and significance to our lives. As a result, working to fulfill our purpose can lead to more profitability personally and corporately in part because we will have a more positive attitude. That improved attitude will allow us to view the challenges of life in a different perspective. Mountains become molehills, nothing seems insurmountable. Sacrifice seems more temporary and more worthwhile. We feel and see victory.

Do you know your purpose? Do you really feel the significance of what you are doing, how it impacts others and adds value to them? If not, know that IT IS NEVER TOO LATE to discover it. At the same time, you don’t want to wait. Some wait too late and miss the opportunity to discover and live that purpose. As Oliver Wendell Holmes said,

Alas for those that never sing,
But die with all their music in them!

Some day may never come and the greatest tragedy of all isn’t taking a risk and losing it all, it’s going to the end of your life on earth with that song still in your heart.

If you know your purpose, truly feel the passion that drives you, I commend you and hope that you are pursuing it on a daily basis. Let me know how I can help you.

If you don’t know your purpose, make a commitment to start TODAY to begin the journey of discovery. Don’t be afraid to seek help finding it. Trusting a professional coach can help you accelerate the process and more accurately identify your purpose. You would not be alone in this; a large number of successful corporate executives use coaches for this and other reasons. However you do it, DON’T WAIT ANOTHER DAY! Take that first step. You can do this, it’s in you. Let the song out.

Action Plan

Sit down RIGHT NOW and do one of two things:
1. If you know your purpose, list the things you need to do DAILY to live it. Schedule time on your calendar to work it and commit yourself to the process.
2. If you don’t know your purpose, commit to do something TODAY to start the process of discovery. Not sure where to start or what to do, find a coach. Do it now.

Risky Business: The Power of WHY

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Why Powers Risk

WHY power makes us do things that others question. It has been almost three years now since I took this very risky venture on several fronts. I chose to work for myself instead of for someone else. I chose to change my primary business from technical training and development to cultivating leadership and personal growth. I chose to invest in being a Founding Partner in the John Maxwell Team and a certified leadership speaker/trainer/coach. I chose to pour my resources into developing that business. For a variety of reasons, it is still not a booming success but I know it is coming and continue to work towards that.

Why Powers Purpose?

The big question I usually get is WHY I chose to make the change to leadership development and fostering personal growth as opposed to sticking where I was with training and development consulting (I still do that by the way). I can only say that it is the answer to that very same WHY that drives me. Over the years I have worked for several companies, large and small, and through that with many client companies. A consistent issue I saw in many organizations is that there was plenty of management going on and very little leadership. And there is a difference, which I have talked about in an Ah-Ha! Moment of the Week video.

And what I saw from this was that most of the problems of the organization was due to that lack of leadership. I truly believe that

Everything Rises and Falls on Leadership

and that the level of effectiveness of leadership is what determines how a company succeeds and grows or withers and dies. Small businesses today especially need to embrace this because in this hard economy it becomes real easy to lose vision what you are trying to accomplish and how you are going to get there. You get lost in the trees of survival that you can no longer see the forest. Then, when things do clear you are totally unprepared to take advantage of the growth opportunities before you. I believe in small business and I believe in YOU and that’s the WHY that drives me every day! It’s why I became the TOP-LINE GUY to help you achieve BOTTOM-LINE RESULTS!

Action Plan

What’s your WHY? Is it specific? Just making money is not enough; just serving people is not enough. You need a WHY that will drive you through hard times. A WHY that will compel you to take risks, financial and otherwise. A WHY that will set the stage for you to swallow pride and independence enough to seek help to excel. A WHY that will drive you to learn what you need to learn and gather who you need to gather. A WHY that demands a legacy to go far beyond where you will ever take it.
Write that WHY down. Remind yourself of it every day. Let it infiltrate your organization in the vision, in the mission statement, in the customer service, in employee relations; in everything you do.
Not sure how to make all that happen? Not sure of your WHY? Seek a coach or partner who can help you identify it, define it, and live it. There’s a reason that highly successful organizations have coaches; because that’s how they became highly successful organizations.

Who Learned the Most About Leadership?

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Return From Camp

As I mentioned in the last post, I recently escorted 19 Boy Scouts to summer camp at Raven Knob Scout Reservation near Mt. Airy, North Carolina. Being as there is generally not a lot for adults to do there, I was able to spend a lot of time observing, reflecting, and planning. This is our second straight year at this camp and we plan to return next year as well, primarily because this particular camp is so well run. The amazing part of it is that the program is almost entirely run by Boy Scouts, not adults. And by almost entirely, I mean that the adults involved are in supporting roles and primarily managerial roles. The Program Director on down are Scouts running the show!

Now, summer camps by necessity are pretty well-structured and offer lots of programs. A Boy Scout camp is no different, offering opportunities for the boys to work towards rank advancement or earning merit badges. All that structure requires a lot of staff members to make it go, providing administration, program, food service, and other elements. When you have a program that is well-organized and runs smoothly with that many factors and personnel involved, and it is run by boys; well, that deserves a little looking at to find out why. So, I did.

The Raven Knob Difference

The Camp Director is Keith Bobbitt and my understanding is that his philosophy and approach is what drives the success of this camp. Keith is what we call a Professional Scouter, an adult who gets paid to do this. In talking with Keith both last year and this year, I am struck by the awesome leadership he exhibits with the summer camp program. Keith has developed a vision and core values that are the cornerstone of the program. Applicants to work summer camp are carefully reviewed and selected. All staff members are required to attend ongoing training in how the camp runs, their roles, and their leadership. As camp goes on, Keith and his team identify staff members who exhibit extraordinary competence and leadership. Those candidates are then provided with additional training and guidance, moved to more challenging roles, and return the next year to serve in higher capacity.

As I mentioned, even the Program Director is a Scout. He is responsible to lead all the section directors (also mostly all Scouts) and lead daily meetings with adult leaders from all the troops that attend to keep them informed. If you have an issue during camp, you will speak to Scout to get it resolved. When I asked Keith Bobbitt about the Program Director role and how he can confidently fill it with a Scout, he told me that the person for the that position has actually been trained over a few years to fill it. He even confidently boasted to me that when the current Program Director ages out of Scouting or moves on, he has 3-4 others already prepared to take that role on and maintain the consistency in the effectiveness of the camp.

Vision, Empowerment, and a Commitment to Excellence

A few take-aways for me stood out from observing the week, not all of it new but certainly reinforced:

Vision helps everyone perform better. What’s amazing about Camp Raven Knob is not just that it is run by boys — other Boy Scout camps do that as well — but rather that it is run so smoothly and efficiently by boys. They were always courteous and helpful. And while those two words are part of the Scout Law and you would expect them to be that way at every camp; the reality is that not all of them go the extra mile with it like they do at Raven Knob. I believe it is because the vision of what they want the camp to be is consistently communicated to the staff. Once they understand the vision, it sets an expectation, which then makes it easier for the staff to behave in a manner consistent with that vision.
Empowerment lets each person contribute and spreads the load. When you provide the vision, tell them to go make it happen, and get out of their way then most everyone will rise to the occasion and perform based on the vision. By empowering the Program Director to run things, make decisions, and make changes as necessary, Keith not only allows that Scout to truly contribute to the success of the camp, he is making his own load lighter as well. When the Program Director allows his section directors to do their jobs and make decisions, he also is developing people and lightening his own load. I daresay that if the Program Director kept all the decision making to himself, he would go crazy around week 2 or 3.
Boys teach me more than I ever teach them. They had challenges of bad weather at points, being in a totally unfamiliar environment, hustling around from session to session all day, and yet took the time to thoroughly enjoy themselves and get to know each other better. I believe our troop firmed up their relationships that week through the shared experiences and the resulting “inside jokes” from that. Litigious spiders, “are we there yet? Yes, get out!”, playing SetBack, and “Hey, Hi!” will all become cultural components of our troop. And it reminded me of things I often forget in “the real world”.