Earlier this week I was reminded of the story of President J F Kennedy’s visit to NASA during which he asked a cleaner what his job was. The cleaner replied and said that he sent rockets to the moon. It’s a good reminder that all of us should feel part of what our organisations actually do. We should take the time to be part of the big picture and always feel connected with the true objectives and purpose of our workplace. As leaders we also have a personal responsibility to find this out, we shouldn’t be reliant on internal communications or wait for someone to tell us.
At work, we are going through an exercise to clarify what our purpose is – the reason we exist and the role we play in the world. It’s a lengthy piece of work that requires collaboration from teams across the business to ensure its fit for the future, reflects our core capabilities and importantly has a detailed plan underneath it.
Linked to the idea of understanding your organisations purpose is the idea of knowing what your own personal purpose is – defining what you are trying to achieve and what success looks like. By spending time thinking about this you are likely to be more motivated and satisfied and clear on how you fit into your wider organisation’s purpose. This is something I always think about when on holiday and can often be found reading books like ‘Finding Your Element’ or ‘The Big Five for Life’ to shape my own personal purpose.
I read this week that we spend on average about 30 years of our life at work. That’s a huge chunk of time and so it’s important that your own personal purpose and values align to your organisations.
Do you know what your personal purpose is?
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