Do You Take Your Purpose Statement Seriously?
Many corporations have taken to producing a purpose statement to summarize what they stand for as an enterprise. At a meeting of Fortune 500 CEOs some years ago, the participants were asked to take part in a brief survey. They were asked:
- Does your company have a purpose statement (85% replied “Yes.”)
- If your company does have a purpose statement, do you use it for guidance when making important decisions (15% of those above replied “Yes.”)
Going strictly by these survey numbers, about 13% of the Fortune 500 took their purpose statements seriously enough to benefit from having one.
Now, suppose you took your purpose statement seriously? What steps would you need to take as a leader? Those who have succeeded at this have given attention to three areas: content, process, and practice.
CONTENT
Compelling purpose statements address five needs:
-
- Physical/Economic
- Social
- Emotional
- Mental
- Spiritual (values and meaning)
Carefully examine your organization’s purpose statement, and you will find these five areas are either included or explain by their absence why the purpose is not very compelling.
Process
- Process is initiated by senior management.
“Politically correct” approaches that begin with the grass roots often fail because they don’t capture leadership’s heart and mind. Start at the top to ensure they are seriously engaged.
- Significant, intense early involvement of others.
Begin at the top, but make sure you get significant, intense, early involvement of others so that they help shape it and own it. Involvement doesn’t mean hearing about it is a mass meeting. Involvement means contributing to it, shaping it and deeply understanding it.
- Stakeholder review and feedback: one way of getting involvement is to open the process up for genuine review and feedback from all stakeholders.
- Integrated sub-unit purposes: if you want people to take the purpose seriously, have them translate the overall purpose into a purpose for their department or work team.
Practice
You need to take the purpose seriously in conducting daily business. Some practical ways to do this:
- Introduce new associates to it by sharing what it does and doesn’t mean on a daily basis.
- Make it constantly visible to all stakeholders.Display it in halls, lobbies, conference rooms, eating/break areas, but, also refer to it in contracts and agreements with suppliers, contractors, customers, and other stakeholders. Most importantly, refer to it when making decisions.
- Align all other organizational elements with the purpose.
- Review periodically, revising as appropriate to reflect changing conditions.
One way of summarizing all this is simply: the process is the product. Once you understand this, you won’t make the common mistake of saying the purpose is “done” when the piece of paper has been produced.
One way of summarizing all this is simply: the process is the product. Once you understand this, you won’t make the common mistake of saying the purpose is “done” when the piece of paper has been produced.