April 2002

Mind Over Management: Purpose: A Key Word to the “Why’s” The power of purpose can lead to great accomplishments from employees.

Lafarge Canada’s Quarry Receives Award for Excellence.

Rogers Group Names New CFO

Purpose—The Key Word to the “Why’s”

By Bill Dyer

While walking home from work one night, a man decided to take a shortcut through a cemetery. He never saw the freshly dug grave until he fell to the bottom of it. For 30 minutes, he desperately tried to climb out, but the walls of the grave were much too steep and slippery. Exhausted, he decided he would have to wait until morning to be rescued. He sat down at one end of the grave and began to doze off, but was suddenly awakened by the sound of “choice words” coming from a second man who had just fallen into the grave! The first man didn’t say a word, but simply watched for two hours as the second man struggled to escape. Seeing that his effort was to no avail, the first man couldn’t help himself. He stood up, walked to the other end of the grave, tapped the guy on the shoulder, and said, “You are never going to get out of here.” The second guy shot out of that grave like a rocket!
This story does great justice to the power of purpose. Most managers don’t pay much attention to the mindset their people bring to work each day. So much can happen to adversely affect people’s attitude and level of performance. There is a direct correlation between the quality and quantity of human output, and the degree of purpose someone has for their job. The more purpose, the more output. The power of purpose was seen in the rescue efforts after 9/11. After the Twin Towers collapsed, one fireman said he talked to his wife to let her know that he escaped the collapse and was safe and alive.
Consequently, he continued working around the clock for three days before coming home. When his wife met him at the door, he gave her a hug, they held each other, and then he went upstairs to see his kids. He held them and kissed them. He could easily have prolonged his hugs and collapsed into bed, but that’s not what happened to the fireman who woke up three days earlier with a purpose of saving lives. When he didn’t sit down, his wife asked what was wrong. He replied, “I’ve got to go back. The rest of my family is still down there.” Physically, mentally, and emotionally exhausted, he kissed his wife, walked out the door, and returned to Ground Zero to search for the rest of his family.
The fireman’s purpose turned ordinary effort into that of heroic proportions. People on purpose are more courageous, resourceful, positive and focused, particularly in adverse conditions. Purpose enables people to square their shoulders, lift their heads and sustain their effort because they know how worthwhile their effort is.
A rut is nothing more than a grave with the ends kicked out. Getting in the rut of simply showing up for work is easy. Coming to work and loving what we do is another thing altogether. One way to love what you do is to love why you do it. Purpose is the why part of that equation and generates new energy and power in people, transforming any job from something that has to be done into something they want to do because of the positive difference it makes. As was the case for the man who shot out of the grave and the fireman who started working a fourth day with no sleep, a sense of purpose generates actions and creates results that were previously not possible. People go above and beyond the minimal requirements of their job.
Once while visiting a quarry, I challenged a group of employees to redefine what they do at work by writing a purpose statement for their job. One of the guys was a loader operator and he came up with the following, “I build roads so kids can get to school, and people can drive to work to support their families and help their kids go to college.” He beamed as he read his purpose for operating his loader. “Driving a loader and scooping up rocks” had been transformed to “paving the way to college for the kids in his community”. This operator identified a higher good for the work he did. He reconnected to something he valued for his kids and expanded on it to create a powerful purpose. As long as he was focused there, the value of his job would exceed the amount of his hourly wage. He felt like a million bucks and new possibilities opened up for how he would contribute to his company.
With his new sense of purpose, he became a more valuable employee. Objectives beyond “safely operating a loader in a cost effective manner,” could now be accomplished. Imagine this operator is eating lunch at his wife’s company picnic and someone asks him what he does for a living. He says, “I build roads so kids can get to school and people can drive to work and support their families.” Compare that answer to, “I operate a loader at the quarry out on Highway 54.” It’s easy to see how purpose can have a tremendous positive impact on being a good community citizen. Purpose can stop some of the negative perceptions that abound about your company and industry. With your operator’s sense of purpose, you just went from a creator of a lot of noise and dust to a contributor to a brighter tomorrow for people in your community.
As a leader of people on a purpose, your troops show up with higher morale and more focus, attention and energy. People can become heroes in your company and community, and accomplish more objectives, more quickly and more effectively. When we fall into a rut, where a job occurs as something we do for 10-12 hours/day, ordinary effort and results get created. A higher purpose will get us out of that trap as quickly as if we have fallen into a grave and suddenly realize that we aren’t alone. When their why’s are big enough, your people will naturally go out and produce extraordinary results.

Bill Dyer is a professional speaker and trainer for Quantum Leap Resources, in Greensboro, N.C.