No, A New Purpose Won’t Solve Your Organisational Problems
By: Rasmus Noah Hansen
Tags: Organizational Change, Organizational Design, Purpose, Organizational Culture, Tension

No, A New Purpose Won’t Solve Your Organisational Problems

As humans, we like to simplify complex problems because it makes it easier to grasp and solve them. One of the most complex challenges organisations face has to do with culture and collaboration because it involves people, their motivation and feelings towards the organisation and its members.

About ten years ago, Simon Sinek introduced “The Golden Circle” on the TedTalk scene, telling how most organisations talked about what they do and how they do it, but only the great ones talked about WHY they do it. The WHY being the organisation’s purpose, their reason to exist!

It seemed like Simon Sinek had found the solution to all organisational challenges with the WHY.

“Do you have unengaged employees? That’s because they don’t have a WHY!”

“Are you struggling with innovation? If you just find your WHY, people will understand how to innovate!”

“Do you have a problem with (insert any challenge an organisation can have)? That obvious, your WHY is not strong enough?

We have just the right solution for you…

What followed were golden days for branding agencies and management consultancies all around the world. They now could charge the big bucks for doing interviews and trend reports for clients. A new vision, new values, a new purpose ending up on the wall with big letters and on the office coffee mugs all around the world. What’s even better was the internal communication plan afterwards — if we just communicate the new purpose in as many ways possible, people will know what to change in how they work, think, feel and collaborate with others. Right?!?

My favourite example is from this article from HBR that explains how the CEO of Mahindra Group, a $20 billion Indian conglomerate, wanted to “define its value proposition” & “ inspire employees to accept no limits, think alternatively, and drive positive change”.

First, he looked back at his 30 years at the company and at the values that had guided him as its leader. Then he delved into what he called the psyche of the organization by conducting internal surveys of managers at all levels. He also did ethnographic research in seven countries to identify themes that resonated with his company’s multinational, cross-cultural employee base. The process took three years, but ultimately Mahindra arrived at “Rise,” which, he realized, had been fundamental to the company from its inception. “‘Rise’ is not a clever tagline,” he has said. “We were already living and operating this way.

Rise. Just let it sit with you for a while. Three years of “delving into the psyche of the organisation” — probably spending millions of dollars on some lucky consultancy along the way and they come up with Rise to “inspire employees to accept no limits, think alternatively, and drive positive change” — whatever that means.

It’s not about what you say, it’s about what you do

The problem with a WHY, values, guidelines, manifest or whatever it is called at your organisation is that it won’t solve the complex challenge of creating a healthy, effective and innovative organisation where people thrive and feel engaged. People don’t get engaged and inspired by imposed values they get engaged by how these values are carried out through the interactions they have with leaders and co-workers, and by the system that is created around living these values. Trust isn’t built with the words you choose to say, but by the actions, you choose to take.

People care about being included, heard and seen in your organisation. They care about how leadership removes barriers instead of creating them through bureaucratic structures and old hierarchies. They care about having ownership and responsibility in their job and about being trusted with making real progress in their work.

Creating a healthy culture is hard, and unfortunately, there’s not a simple recipe that works for everyone. It takes time and energy to discover what is needed in your organisation for people to be happy, engaged and energized when going to work.

So, instead of spending all of your time (and money) on choosing the right words to put on your coffee mugs, you should ask your people “what is holding you back from doing your best work?” and then do everything in your power to remove those barriers.