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Three ways to reframe your purpose.

The vast majority of humans throughout history worked because they had to. Many found comfort, value, and meaning in their efforts, but some defined work as a necessity to be avoided if possible. For centuries, elites in societies from Europe to Asia aspired to absolution from gainful employment. Aristotle defined a “man in freedom” as the pinnacle of human existence, an individual freed of any concern for the necessities of life and with nearly complete personal agency. (Tellingly, he did not define wealthy merchants as free to the extent that their minds were pre-occupied with acquisition.)

The promise of AI and automation raises new questions about the role of work in our lives. Most of us will remain focused for decades to come on activities of physical or financial production, but as technology provides services and goods at ever-lower cost, human beings will be compelled to discover new roles — roles that aren’t necessarily tied to how we conceive of work today.

Many companies confuse purpose, vision and mission statements, often using them interchangeably, blurring their true meaning.

Purpose is what guides you. It articulates why you do what you do, why your organisation exists.
Mission is what drives you. It is the strategic path your organisation follows to fulfil your vision.
Vision is what you aspire to. It is the destination it you wish to reach, the state into which you hope to transform over time.
In other words, Purpose is your why. Mission is your how. Vision is your where and what.

What makes coaching effective, and what’s the role of emotional intelligence (EQ)?
New research published in the Journal of Experiential Psychotherapy (Stillman, Freedman, Jorgensen, & Stillman, 2017) reiterates the powerful link between EQ and effective coaching. . . both for coaches and clients.

Most companies have articulated their purpose — the reason they exist. But very few have made that purpose a reality for their organizations.

Consider Nokia. Before the iPhone was introduced, in 2007, Nokia was the dominant mobile phone maker with a clearly stated purpose — “Connecting people” — and an aggressive strategy for sustaining market dominance. Seeking to extend its technological edge (particularly in miniaturization), it acquired more than 100 startup companies while pursuing a vast portfolio of research and product development projects. In 2006 alone, Nokia introduced 39 new mobile-device models. Few imagined that this juggernaut, brandishing vast resources with such steely determination, could be quickly brought down.

In retrospect, it seems inevitable. Nokia was so immersed in executing its strategy that it lost sight of its purpose. When Steve Jobs introduced the first iPhone as “a leapfrog product that is way smarter than any mobile device has ever been, and super-easy to use,” Apple started “connecting people” at astounding new levels. Nokia’s purpose had been co-opted, making its myriad strengths irrelevant. The once-dominant Nokia soon lost much of its market cap and was eventually acquired by Microsoft.

A new book suggests that our jobs can be improved if we focus on seeking purpose, hope, and positive relationships at work.

Often as coaches, we work with coachees who are disengaged with their current work and life. They may be successful in their chosen profession and may have achieved all they wanted to. They don’t see anything more worth achieving. Yet they still have 20 or more years of productive life in front of them.

We might typically work to re-engage such a coachee by getting them to re-examine their values and what’s important to them, and we work with them to help find new meaning in what they do or to find something that gives them meaning and purpose.

I’d like to propose a simple tool that can help in this direction.