Over-Purposing and Ill-Purposing
By: Paul Mayer
Tags: Purpose Driven Business, Life, Purpose, Impact

Lately, I have been asking myself sometimes if we overemphasize the meaning of purpose. Or rather use Purpose in a wrong way. For myself, the chase for the ultimate purpose I could serve has been very elusive. Approaching the chase with the question “how can I have the biggest possible impact” is flawed. In our complex world, there is not one ultimate purpose. There are many equally relevant purposes you can serve and due to today’s complexity thousands of ways to fulfill a purpose. Add to this the uncertainty of which way might one day be successful and actually have an impact, as well as your set of values and ability that contribute to a certain way and you have the master web of complexity.

This extreme complexity I think leads many of us to seek ways that obviously contribute to a purpose such as working for a non-profit. We don’t want to put in the cognitive work of really identifying which ways are the most likely to have an outsized impact as well as the discipline to follow a path that might take 5 or 10 years to eventually have a huge impact.

I’ll give you an example. I really want to enable people to be a better version of themselves. One possible way of doing that is enabling them to become more conscious of how they spend their money. Give them a tool that lets them be more responsible, more sustainable and more intentional with their spending. I’ve been considering joining a fintech that is currently not much more than a digital bank but due to its technology focus could one day provide people with the central tool that allows them to be conscious money spenders. This would have a tremendous, very pragmatic impact on how people live their lives and bring our society to a higher level of consciousness. At first sight, though, it might look easier for someone who wants people to become versions of themselves better to just go into education or work for a non-profit that raises awareness for conscious consumption. But once you make an effort and dive deep into all the little corners of a person’s life you see so many other opportunities to bring out better versions of people. More importantly, you discover that a tool people use every single day, a central tool of their lives will have an outsized impact compared to just running awareness campaigns. Commuting yourself to such an opportunity with the clarity of what it can do for people one day if applied in the right way is following a true purpose. A purpose way more clear, more pragmatic and more achievable than just fighting for better education.

A purpose is only worth as much as the tool with which it is turned into reality. When people tell you that they are serving a higher purpose than you don’t let them get away with such a simple statement. Challenge them and drive down into the details to see if they are actually heading towards more positive impact than you do. Never settle for comparing purposes without also comparing their vehicles of turning visions into reality.

A super lofty purpose often keeps people from finding and executing actionable, scalable ideas. Just the idea of working for such a high purpose can give so much satisfaction that you forgot to get your hands dirty and do what is necessary to have an impact. I’m not saying that you shouldn’t have a lofty purpose. But make sure you figure out how to serve and don’t get lost in the sole idea of the purpose itself.