When an Organisation Blows Up its Purpose

If you’ve ever wondered “what’s the commercial value of business purpose clarity?” then the PwC Australia case study playing out right now is one for the ages.

In brief, the firm is accused – as advisers to government under non-disclosure agreements – of using confidential information for commercial gain, tipping off their clients of looming tax changes and helping them develop work arounds (refer PwC’s statement or ABC’s video summary).

Whether it can survive and recover is anyone’s guess, with criminal charges not out of the question. And it’s not a case of a rogue consultant, this went far and wide within the firm.

What is PwC’s purpose statement I hear you ask?

“Our purpose is to build trust in society and solve important problems”

#fail

It highlights the fact that too many corporate purpose statements represent fiction rather than fact. Companies have become quite adept at forming eloquent purpose statements that make your heart sing. I help organisations with this task from time to time and the key message I push out is: this is merely a statement of intent, you have to actually do it.

So it may not surprise you to learn that, what they are not so good at by and large, is doing it. So what does ‘doing it’ really mean? This is a challenge that many executives and directors are turning to right now.

It’s firstly about governance, how do you know if you are delivering on your purpose or not?

  • What do you measure?
  • How do measure it?
  • Who is accountable?

Furthermore, when remuneration is misaligned with the purpose of the firm, as would appear to be the case with PwC Australia, then the temptations can be too great.

To adopt and implement corporate purpose, it is about hard coding the benefit you aim to deliver to society into the DNA of the firm, not treating it as a passing fancy for the annual offsite and a bunch of rah rah associated with it.

Having conquered governance – and very few firms have managed to do that – the overall goals and measures have to be pushed down through to strategy, operations and people.

It’s seldom about reinventing the way you do business, it’s about putting a purpose-lens or overlay onto your existing processes.

The hard work pays off many times over. Ignore it and you may end up like our good friends at PwC Australia, facing an existential crisis, and all because several partners saw fit to put their own greed above that of their client’s interests.

On the upside, they have reminded us all about the value of trust. 🍏

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Phil Preston is a keynote speaker and facilitator who helps individuals, teams and organisations draw upon the power of purpose for high performance with positive impact. He is the author of Connecting Profit with Purpose, host of The Purpose Edge podcast and you can contact him via hello@philpreston.com.au

Making Quiet Quitting Obsolete

How do you make quiet quitting obsolete? Being a purpose specialist I guess you’d expect me to say it’s all about clarity and implementation of purpose, and you’d be right!

When purpose is well executed it leads to energising and exciting work cultures that take quiet quitting out of play. The catch? They are hard to create, but once you have them in place, a little bit of ongoing attention is usually enough to sustain them.

 

 

Is quiet quitting new?

Did you know that before quiet quitting there was the Chinese equivalent of “lying flat“? They both describe a philosophy of doing the bare minimum in your job, either because you don’t care enough or because you don’t see the point in sacrificing quality of life outside of work for the lure of corporate ascension.

I’m sure you’ve worked with people who have checked out of their job …or never checked in to start with. You see it in most work environments and thanks to social media platforms we are seeing a revival tour of this practice.

The evidence suggests quiet quitting isn’t a new concept at all. Gallup data going back 20-years shows there’s little change in the “actively disengaged” portion of the workforce.

 

 

What are your options?

Location, skillset or other factors may limit your alternative employment options, in which case the challenge is to reframe your work experience. That can be hard if there are deep-seated problems with co-workers, managers or the organisation itself.

If you do have alternatives, though, then I don’t see why you’d want to hang around in a role that isn’t interesting or inspiring if there are better opportunities out there. Life is finite, why choose misery?

For executives, leaders and managers, your task is to brighten up the work experience to avert any enthusiasm (or is it apathy?) for quiet quitting, and a purpose-led approach provides the foundations you need.

 

 

Making quiet quitting obsolete

First of all, it’s about a positive mindset and thinking creatively rather than falling into a defensive state. Secondly, attaining a deeper understanding of purpose and they way it manifests in your work and life provides the key to a considered and powerful response.

It’s one thing to say “purpose is great” and another thing to actually understand what you are doing and making it happen. A purpose-led response requires an awareness of, and focus on, these 5 layers:

  1. Personal – the goals or sense of purpose you gain outside of work
  2. Professional – purpose derived from developing your career and craft
  3. Role – purpose vested in the day-to-day role you perform
  4. Team – the dynamic, culture and sense of achievement in your team
  5. Organisational – the purpose of your organisation or industry you’re in.
 
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Each of these 5 components takes time and skill to develop, however it’s a useful blueprint to work from. Do a quick self check-in now to gauge where you are at?

If these aspects are worked on and progress is made, then work is going to be a positive place where you and others can thrive. It doesn’t mean giving over your life to your employer – strong work cultures are built on quality (more than quantity) of human input.

If people around you don’t buy in to a purpose based approach, then you seriously have to ask whether they are doing themselves a disservice by being there? Other life choices may make more sense.

 

 

Next steps for you?

A purpose-led approach can make quiet quitting obsolete. However it requires the right level of focus from directors to executives to managers and frontline staff, plus a willingness to challenge the status quo.

The gains are hard won … and the rewards are transformational.

 

Phil Preston is a purpose and impact specialist. As a keynote speaker, facilitator, author and coach, he empowers positive change in the people, teams and organisations he works with. You can contact him via hello@philpreston.com.au

Copyright Phil Preston 2022, All rights reserved

Banner photo credit: Sander Sammy via unsplash.com

Should Recruiters Be Worried if Their People Lack a Bigger Purpose?

Purpose has evolved beyond the forms of social good that we are familiar with such as giving, volunteering and responsible business practices, to something that is much more strategic and core to success. As Simon Mulcahy of Salesforce notes:

“Societal issues are becoming business issues”

This shift has huge implications for employees because younger generations seek a new type of purpose ‘experience’. It also gels with the evidence provided in Tribal Leadership that employees in high performing cultures feel bonded by collectively taking on a noble cause – something bigger than the company itself – which equates to having clarity of purpose.

Recruitment firms have a natural tailwind in this regard because employment is viewed as being good for society, however they will struggle if they fail to evolve and take the extra steps needed to clarify their purpose and make it real to their people’s everyday work.

With talk of ‘the great resignation’ due to greater flexibility and working professionals reviewing their priorities and purpose in life – a deeper dive into this issue could hardly come at a better time for recruiters from both a staffing and client perspective.

Recruitment industry authority, Ross Clennett, invited me to collaboratively review the sector’s approach to purpose and present the findings to recruitment business owners.


WHAT’S CHANGED?

Younger employees expect so much more from their employer than previous generations, with Gen Zs wanting purpose to be core to their work, and 61 per cent saying their biggest fear is being stuck in a job that isn’t fulfilling. 

This shift in employee needs can be characterised in three distinct ways:

  1. Work is more than a role or career pathway, young people want to work for an employer who is a partner in their life’s goals.
  2. Not only do they want to work in a dynamic team environment, their day to day work must be connected to a higher cause.
  3. Culture and leadership is important, and they want to be inspired by the overall purpose of their organisation.

 

 

HOW HARD IS IT?

A recent executive survey by Brandpie found that 60 per cent of CEOs who have or want a company purpose admit they are uncertain about how to enact it – research that is consistent with Porter Novelli’s findings that 87 per cent say they need help navigating purpose and the societal issues of the day.

On the flip side, leading companies are already realising the benefits of purpose. Food and beverage company, Lion Co, has a purpose of “bringing people together to be sociable and live well” which may help explain why it took on the full strength beer market with a mid-strength beer and won. They also screen job candidates for their purpose ‘mindset’ in the recruitment process. Why? Because this is a non-negotiable feature for their company culture.

 

RECRUITMENT INSIGHTS

We covered a lot of ground in our sessions, so I’ll summarise three of our key insights:

1. PURPOSE QUALITY VARIES

In analysing the purpose statements of seven large recruitment companies, their quality was variable. The main reason being that some statements spoke more to their financial or market differentiation ambitions than to the benefit to society their business aims to create.

 

2. COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGE

We looked at five examples of using a purpose lens to create financial or market advantage, including a major recruitment firm that supports youths who struggle to gain access to regular employment opportunities.

Not only is their program highly engaging for staff, they benefit commercially from the closer relationships they build with their own customers (large corporations), connecting them with a new market segment and convenient solution to some of their corporate social responsibility obligations.  

3. VALUES ≄ PURPOSE

We looked at best practice in how companies structure their ‘purpose’ and why values are not the same as purpose. Values are the highly prized features of your culture and organisational DNA that you see as being essential to your future success, which is quite different to the ‘social objective’ conveyed by your business purpose.

One of our session attendees mentioned they were in the process of articulating their purpose and there was confusion with values, so in the discussion we were able to work through this together.


START WITH GENUINE INTENT

If there’s one important lesson that comes from companies that have successfully articulated and implemented their purpose, it is that you have to be genuine and prepared to just get started!

Delivering purpose profitably – as distinct from making a profit and giving some back – requires greater proficiency in social, economic and environmental outcomes. It may require working with new partners in new ways and you’ll have some reality checks along the way.

Ross pointed to the leadership of Talent International’s Richard Earl, who talks with humility about creating their foundation arm, Talent RISE, saying that it took a few goes to get their initiatives working in the way they’d intended.


HOW DO YOU RATE?

A purpose statement is essential, however it counts for little if your people don’t understand what it means, believe in it or know how it could or should impact their every day work. You can ask your people the following questions to gauge how well you are doing:

  • Is our business purpose well articulated?
  • Do we understand why it is what it is?
  • Does everyone take it seriously?
  • Do we ferociously protect it?
  • Do we embrace our team’s contribution to it?
  • Do we understand how it drives business performance?
  • Do we use it to guide the decisions we make?
  • Are we encouraged to call out instances where our actions compromise our purpose?
  • Is there congruence between what we say and what we actually do?
  • Are we attracting and retaining the best talent in the market through our purpose?
  • Is everyone inspired by our purpose?

Purpose requires patience and persistence, however it will pay off because it is the ‘ticket to play’ for every business in the ‘purpose economy’ that we suddenly find ourselves in. 

Recruitment firms are no different, hence their owners and leaders would do well to connect their people to a purpose bigger than simply filling their clients’ jobs with the best candidates.

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Phil Preston is a purpose speaker, strategist and founder of The Business Purpose Project. He is the author of Connecting Profit with Purpose and co-host of Corporate Conversations on Purpose. You can contact him via phil@businesspurposeproject.com