Start With Why: Answering the question “What do you do?”

one of the most difficult questions we
ever get asked is what do you do and we
usually tell people what we do I’m a
manager at you know some widget company
and nobody really cares because nobody
cares what you do and so we’re supposed
to answer the question with why we do
what we do that just takes practice
again so let me give you a couple of
examples of how it worked I found myself
at a meeting once it was actually a
social event held at an organization and
I was talking to one of the guys and
telling him about stuff that I do and he
says you’ve got to tell the boss I said
okay and so he walked me over to the the
big guy and he doesn’t even make an
introduction he just leaves me standing
there and walks away and the guy turns
to me goes who are you now if I wasn’t
starting with why it say hi my name is
Simon and I have a consultancy and I
speak and I teach a knight and I and I’m
an author and I and I go through all the
things that I’ve done and all the people
I work with and maybe some of my clients
all in an attempt to tell him of Who I
am and why you should listen to me but
then he would have just sort of pointed
to the chips and said nice to meet you
you know but I didn’t say that I looked
in the eye and I said I wake up every
single day to inspire people to do what
inspires them and I know that your
company is is trying to increase the
amount of customers it’s getting in one
particular sector and the question is
are you inspiring people to do it
because the only way people will give
you loyalties if you inspire them to do
so I teach leaders and organizations how
to inspire people
that’s all I said I didn’t tell them
what I did I didn’t tell them who I knew
I didn’t tell him any of my clients and
he said to me looks over to me says you
have a business card I handed them a
business card and I told them all the
details later don’t forget a why doesn’t
close the deal it just opens it it
allows people in it gets context you
know all of these things need to work
together why you do what you do how you
do things in what you do I don’t for one
second believe the why is more important
than any of the other pieces it’s just
the place we have to start and it’s also
the place we so often forget to even
include so learning to start with why
really is especially in a business
context when you’re interviewing for a
job or pitching your services to someone
it really is remarkable I get so many
letters from people you know all excited
that they went into a pit
they went into a job interview and they
started with why and they were so
excited that not only did they get the
job but the person who hired them
actually saying we love dot dot dot and
they repeat their why back to them they
don’t talk about their qualifications or
any of these things in other words it
really does Drive human behavior and the
more you get good at it the more you
start to feel and see the results of
starting with wife