sometimes purpose sneaks up on you it
finds you in the dark of night whispers
in your ear and makes you turn around
and wonder where you are other times it
smacks you upside the head spits water
in your ear and leaves you broke and
exhausted in a diner in Poughkeepsie but
that’s the story for another time I was
looking for a metaphor for what it’s
like to live without purpose on the
other hand finding your purpose so easy
when I discovered my purpose I felt like
I’d spent my whole life wandering around
in the dark and one day someone turned
on the lights
once your purpose finds you it’s like a
tractor beam it’s unapologetic it won’t
listen to reason
try as you might to resist it knows
where you’re going humans are strange
creatures we lock ourselves in basements
and windowless rooms we chained
ourselves to desks for days on end our
confirmation bias our tendency to see
and hear what we already know to be true
is as strong as well set cement our life
so easily become an obstacle course of
Forgotten Dreams we lay waste to the
precious natural resources of the planet
to produce consumer goods designed to
distract us from our boredom and when
they leave us feeling empty and cold we
discard them into landfills dust to dust
life on Earth in 2017 is a strange
invention indeed purpose is what happens
when we decide to break the mold when we
decide we’re not gonna sit there and
take it anymore
I’d like to say that my purpose had
always been clear but it wasn’t I found
it the same way we all do trekking
through life in 2015 I traveled to ten
countries speaking with people from
vastly different walks of life the
project started as a work assignment but
what happened in the process was the
discovery on my own speaking with
community leaders and entrepreneurs from
so many different cultures
contacts helped me realize that our
future is what we make of it when I
finally decided to start my own company
I did it with blind clarity not knowing
is the only predictable part of taking
terrifying risks one of the first stops
on my journey took me to the northern
hills of Guatemala a small Community
Foundation started in 2005 by my former
employer provided skills training and
support to individuals in the local
community who wanted to start a business
one woman I spoke with a rally against
Alice had received support from the
foundation to start a bakery might sound
straightforward enough but at the time
Oralia only knew how to bake one kind of
bread and she had no idea how to run a
business but the courses that the
foundation offered in bread baking and
business management inspired her to
imagine that she could become a baker
this town doesn’t have enough bread she
thought that’s a need I’m going to fill
a rally and her husband worked for years
to save the money they needed but pretty
soon our alia was literally cooking with
gas she bought a commercial oven and
pretty soon was able to expand her
operations from her immediate village to
the nearby town of San Jose when I spoke
with her rally in 2015 she knew how to
bake 26 different kinds of bread and
pastries all of which she bakes and
sells in both of her stores I asked her
alia what inspired her to become a baker
and as she gathered herself to answer
tears came to her eyes her alia and her
husband barely graduated from the 6th
grade and in her lifetime she never
imagined that she would have a future
beyond manual labor by starting a
business she had gained the capacity to
change not just her life but the lives
of her children her eldest daughter was
a senior in high school preparing to
attend college the following year and a
rally Oh was hopeful that her two
younger children would have the same
opportunity she knew that her family’s
transformation was only possible because
of the support and encouragement that
she had received I left Guatemala but
a leas experience stayed with me so many
of us set out to live the lives we think
we should who defines that should is
variable it can be our teachers our
parents our community society at large
our religion the list of shudders is
long but when we do what we think we
should we’re contorting ourselves into
someone else’s vision of our life we’re
trying so hard to meet someone else’s
expectations that we lose track of our
own I realized how easy it is for us to
succumb to our own weakness to believe
the voice in our head that negates us
and puts us down but a rowdy I never let
should and control her when she decided
to start a bakery she never let doubt
earn probability stand in the way of her
commitment to her newfound purpose the
next stop on my journey took me to
Eastern Europe where I had the chance to
interview entrepreneurs from Poland and
Romania who had started businesses after
the end of the Cold War as communist
regimes imploded state-run companies
were privatized or closed down to give
you a sense of what Eastern Europe was
like in 1991 imagine if Walmart Target
Amazon and your local supermarket all
decided to close their doors on the same
day for good people had to figure out
how to feed themselves and their
families but the folks I took I spoke
with they didn’t cower at the impending
change they weren’t afraid of the
scarcity they were excited by it they
saw the free market as a whole new world
of opportunity and they had the chance
to become its pioneers Tibby Abraham was
a young electrical engineer when the
Berlin Wall fell he thought that he
should focus where he already had skills
so he decided to start an electrical
device company it’s easy to joke about
the mindlessness of widget making but
Tibby saw a market and he made it today
his company exports security devices to
25 countries and is on track to become a
10 million dollar business this year but
Tibia wasn’t alone in his efforts
between 1992 and 1999 the US Agency for
International
development deployed business executives
from across the United States to
volunteer in Eastern Europe helping
small businesses professionalize John
Mellor a retired Harvard Business School
professor helped to be in his team to
create a long-term business strategy
which clarified their vision and purpose
a plan
Tibbie still refers to to this day of
course Tibby and his colleagues would
have started their company regardless of
the support that they received from John
but the wise counsel of an experienced
executive enabled them to make rapid
progress overcoming the challenges that
can confront small businesses in their
early years their business plan earned
them a $50,000 loan which helped them to
achieve six-figure revenue targets the
very same year setting the path for
their future growth most things are
impossible if we try them alone
you may know the African proverb if you
want to go fast go alone if you want to
go far go together
but speed isn’t always a meaningful
measure of progress and going together
can be tough too knowing who to go with
can be the hardest part and we don’t
always agree on where we should be
headed first making lasting change
requires collaboration creativity and
patience and a recognition that the next
right answer isn’t always obvious as
change makers strategists and
entrepreneurs we have to get comfortable
being uncomfortable to meet uncertainty
with a clarity of conviction and a
willingness to seek out support faced
with an unpredictable future Tibbie
embrace the opportunity to learn from
someone with a lot more experience he
was proud to have the chance to help
Romania enter the global economy of the
21st century from Romania I traveled to
Cross River State Nigeria a province
known for its tourism back in 2006
former governor Donald Duke had invested
heavily in tourism across the state
particularly in the capital city of
Calabar ten Nigerian tourism
entrepreneurs received grants and
technical support as part of Dukes
efforts to reinvigorate the local
economy Charles Gottfried
was one of those
NORs Charles had spent his career in
hospitality working his way up from an
HR assistant to a banquet clerk to a
banquet manager to a front desk manager
finally becoming a nightshift manager at
the Sheraton Lagos the country’s
preeminent four-star hotel he decided to
use his experience in luxury hospitality
to train young frontline workers before
he received support his company wasn’t
especially well-known but the visibility
he received as a result of the trainings
that he provided as part of Dukes
economic investment program catapulted
his company into the national spotlight
today
Charles’s company is recommended across
Nigeria and he trains more than 1,000
hospitality workers each year purpose
doesn’t have to be sexy to be powerful
charles turned a life spent in
hospitality one of the most challenging
industries in the world into a higher
calling he wanted to help frontline
workers provide a premium guest
experience by placing purpose by placing
customer service at the heart of his
company he created a compass to guide
its future growth by bringing a culture
of customer service to Nigeria he was
changing his country’s culture one
waiter at a time it takes courage to
take center stage to dedicate yourself
to your craft and to dance with
uncertainty and it can be hard to summon
that courage alone we need collaborators
strategists writers designers product
managers and of course customers one way
or another
my purpose has always been helping other
people find theirs but after spending
the better part of a decade helping
other people communicate and execute
their visions I realized I was finally
ready to take the leap to commit to my
own it’s not uncommon for a purpose
you’ve been holding at arm’s length to
jump out at you in a moment of darkness
I had quit my job and spent three
harrowing months working on a losing
political campaign it was only then that
I could sit still long enough to see the
inevitable future that had been staring
me in the face
all along I suddenly realized that I was
on a personal mission to inspire people
to get closer to their source material
their creative essence to find the
support they need to make their personal
passion a reality almost every company
starts with a bold unlikely vision of
future possibility that vision usually
comes from a small group of founders
with an ambitious aspiration but a bold
ambitious vision won’t protect you from
the challenges that can overtake you
along the way once a company becomes big
enough and influential enough that bold
ambitious vision can fade from view
shackled to the performance metric of
share price fortune 500 companies often
make horrendous decisions and damaging
trade-offs to protect their singular
measure of value they don’t care how
many people are fired or underemployed
in the process or how many metric tons
of co2 they produce so long as they
deliver their expected shareholder
return without values to guide them the
dedicated pursuit of purpose can very
easily become a singular pursuit of
profit an ambitious vision while awesome
and awe-inspiring is necessary but
insufficient to sustain future progress
cataloging your values along with your
vision can help you hone in on your why
when you add your values to your vision
that’s where you find your purpose by
placing your values and vision at the
heart of your life and work you start to
create that moral compass to help you
manifest the change you wish to see in
the world by prioritizing your higher
purpose in this way you can play a
pivotal role
in reshaping the whole of humanity so
take out a pen or your preferred writing
device it can be your phone and write
down the biggest challenge that you see
confronting humanity the thing that
really keeps you up at night
maybe it’s climate change or gender
equity education or health perhaps it’s
treating a specific disease or helping
small businesses in your community you
name it that’s the problem your most
passionate about now consider how you
personally want to make a dent in that
wall here’s a hint what’s the thing
people have been telling you you’d be
great at your whole life but you have
always insisted on putting your fingers
in your ears and saying no then consider
your eulogy how do you want to be
remembered for some of you this may be
crystal clear right away it’s okay if
it’s not take the time to think it
through this is how we get closer to the
vision of the change we want to be in
the world then begin to catalog your
values what are the core truths you live
by is it honesty
curiosity gumption voice compassion
patience collaboration courage there’s
no one right answer to this question
each of us have personal values that
guide our lives and work when you write
them down and explain what they mean to
you you sparked you start to build that
moral compass your purpose that will
guide you on life’s long and winding
journey our world doesn’t always look
kindly on such brash moral vision when
efficiency productivity and share price
are king it can be hard to defy the
status quo and nobody likes going first
but daring to go boldly in a new
direction to accept risks that others
might not – unequivocally reject the
fear that holds so many of us back and
to unapologetically commit to our values
to stand up
what we believe in that’s the hard work
that really pays off
I think of irelia and her fearlessness
in the face of improbable odds or Tibby
and his eagerness to receive support
from someone more experienced than he
was or Charles and his deep-seated
commitment to his values vision
imagination persistence purpose that’s
the reason I’m here I hope that’s the
reason you are – thank you
finds you in the dark of night whispers
in your ear and makes you turn around
and wonder where you are other times it
smacks you upside the head spits water
in your ear and leaves you broke and
exhausted in a diner in Poughkeepsie but
that’s the story for another time I was
looking for a metaphor for what it’s
like to live without purpose on the
other hand finding your purpose so easy
when I discovered my purpose I felt like
I’d spent my whole life wandering around
in the dark and one day someone turned
on the lights
once your purpose finds you it’s like a
tractor beam it’s unapologetic it won’t
listen to reason
try as you might to resist it knows
where you’re going humans are strange
creatures we lock ourselves in basements
and windowless rooms we chained
ourselves to desks for days on end our
confirmation bias our tendency to see
and hear what we already know to be true
is as strong as well set cement our life
so easily become an obstacle course of
Forgotten Dreams we lay waste to the
precious natural resources of the planet
to produce consumer goods designed to
distract us from our boredom and when
they leave us feeling empty and cold we
discard them into landfills dust to dust
life on Earth in 2017 is a strange
invention indeed purpose is what happens
when we decide to break the mold when we
decide we’re not gonna sit there and
take it anymore
I’d like to say that my purpose had
always been clear but it wasn’t I found
it the same way we all do trekking
through life in 2015 I traveled to ten
countries speaking with people from
vastly different walks of life the
project started as a work assignment but
what happened in the process was the
discovery on my own speaking with
community leaders and entrepreneurs from
so many different cultures
contacts helped me realize that our
future is what we make of it when I
finally decided to start my own company
I did it with blind clarity not knowing
is the only predictable part of taking
terrifying risks one of the first stops
on my journey took me to the northern
hills of Guatemala a small Community
Foundation started in 2005 by my former
employer provided skills training and
support to individuals in the local
community who wanted to start a business
one woman I spoke with a rally against
Alice had received support from the
foundation to start a bakery might sound
straightforward enough but at the time
Oralia only knew how to bake one kind of
bread and she had no idea how to run a
business but the courses that the
foundation offered in bread baking and
business management inspired her to
imagine that she could become a baker
this town doesn’t have enough bread she
thought that’s a need I’m going to fill
a rally and her husband worked for years
to save the money they needed but pretty
soon our alia was literally cooking with
gas she bought a commercial oven and
pretty soon was able to expand her
operations from her immediate village to
the nearby town of San Jose when I spoke
with her rally in 2015 she knew how to
bake 26 different kinds of bread and
pastries all of which she bakes and
sells in both of her stores I asked her
alia what inspired her to become a baker
and as she gathered herself to answer
tears came to her eyes her alia and her
husband barely graduated from the 6th
grade and in her lifetime she never
imagined that she would have a future
beyond manual labor by starting a
business she had gained the capacity to
change not just her life but the lives
of her children her eldest daughter was
a senior in high school preparing to
attend college the following year and a
rally Oh was hopeful that her two
younger children would have the same
opportunity she knew that her family’s
transformation was only possible because
of the support and encouragement that
she had received I left Guatemala but
a leas experience stayed with me so many
of us set out to live the lives we think
we should who defines that should is
variable it can be our teachers our
parents our community society at large
our religion the list of shudders is
long but when we do what we think we
should we’re contorting ourselves into
someone else’s vision of our life we’re
trying so hard to meet someone else’s
expectations that we lose track of our
own I realized how easy it is for us to
succumb to our own weakness to believe
the voice in our head that negates us
and puts us down but a rowdy I never let
should and control her when she decided
to start a bakery she never let doubt
earn probability stand in the way of her
commitment to her newfound purpose the
next stop on my journey took me to
Eastern Europe where I had the chance to
interview entrepreneurs from Poland and
Romania who had started businesses after
the end of the Cold War as communist
regimes imploded state-run companies
were privatized or closed down to give
you a sense of what Eastern Europe was
like in 1991 imagine if Walmart Target
Amazon and your local supermarket all
decided to close their doors on the same
day for good people had to figure out
how to feed themselves and their
families but the folks I took I spoke
with they didn’t cower at the impending
change they weren’t afraid of the
scarcity they were excited by it they
saw the free market as a whole new world
of opportunity and they had the chance
to become its pioneers Tibby Abraham was
a young electrical engineer when the
Berlin Wall fell he thought that he
should focus where he already had skills
so he decided to start an electrical
device company it’s easy to joke about
the mindlessness of widget making but
Tibby saw a market and he made it today
his company exports security devices to
25 countries and is on track to become a
10 million dollar business this year but
Tibia wasn’t alone in his efforts
between 1992 and 1999 the US Agency for
International
development deployed business executives
from across the United States to
volunteer in Eastern Europe helping
small businesses professionalize John
Mellor a retired Harvard Business School
professor helped to be in his team to
create a long-term business strategy
which clarified their vision and purpose
a plan
Tibbie still refers to to this day of
course Tibby and his colleagues would
have started their company regardless of
the support that they received from John
but the wise counsel of an experienced
executive enabled them to make rapid
progress overcoming the challenges that
can confront small businesses in their
early years their business plan earned
them a $50,000 loan which helped them to
achieve six-figure revenue targets the
very same year setting the path for
their future growth most things are
impossible if we try them alone
you may know the African proverb if you
want to go fast go alone if you want to
go far go together
but speed isn’t always a meaningful
measure of progress and going together
can be tough too knowing who to go with
can be the hardest part and we don’t
always agree on where we should be
headed first making lasting change
requires collaboration creativity and
patience and a recognition that the next
right answer isn’t always obvious as
change makers strategists and
entrepreneurs we have to get comfortable
being uncomfortable to meet uncertainty
with a clarity of conviction and a
willingness to seek out support faced
with an unpredictable future Tibbie
embrace the opportunity to learn from
someone with a lot more experience he
was proud to have the chance to help
Romania enter the global economy of the
21st century from Romania I traveled to
Cross River State Nigeria a province
known for its tourism back in 2006
former governor Donald Duke had invested
heavily in tourism across the state
particularly in the capital city of
Calabar ten Nigerian tourism
entrepreneurs received grants and
technical support as part of Dukes
efforts to reinvigorate the local
economy Charles Gottfried
was one of those
NORs Charles had spent his career in
hospitality working his way up from an
HR assistant to a banquet clerk to a
banquet manager to a front desk manager
finally becoming a nightshift manager at
the Sheraton Lagos the country’s
preeminent four-star hotel he decided to
use his experience in luxury hospitality
to train young frontline workers before
he received support his company wasn’t
especially well-known but the visibility
he received as a result of the trainings
that he provided as part of Dukes
economic investment program catapulted
his company into the national spotlight
today
Charles’s company is recommended across
Nigeria and he trains more than 1,000
hospitality workers each year purpose
doesn’t have to be sexy to be powerful
charles turned a life spent in
hospitality one of the most challenging
industries in the world into a higher
calling he wanted to help frontline
workers provide a premium guest
experience by placing purpose by placing
customer service at the heart of his
company he created a compass to guide
its future growth by bringing a culture
of customer service to Nigeria he was
changing his country’s culture one
waiter at a time it takes courage to
take center stage to dedicate yourself
to your craft and to dance with
uncertainty and it can be hard to summon
that courage alone we need collaborators
strategists writers designers product
managers and of course customers one way
or another
my purpose has always been helping other
people find theirs but after spending
the better part of a decade helping
other people communicate and execute
their visions I realized I was finally
ready to take the leap to commit to my
own it’s not uncommon for a purpose
you’ve been holding at arm’s length to
jump out at you in a moment of darkness
I had quit my job and spent three
harrowing months working on a losing
political campaign it was only then that
I could sit still long enough to see the
inevitable future that had been staring
me in the face
all along I suddenly realized that I was
on a personal mission to inspire people
to get closer to their source material
their creative essence to find the
support they need to make their personal
passion a reality almost every company
starts with a bold unlikely vision of
future possibility that vision usually
comes from a small group of founders
with an ambitious aspiration but a bold
ambitious vision won’t protect you from
the challenges that can overtake you
along the way once a company becomes big
enough and influential enough that bold
ambitious vision can fade from view
shackled to the performance metric of
share price fortune 500 companies often
make horrendous decisions and damaging
trade-offs to protect their singular
measure of value they don’t care how
many people are fired or underemployed
in the process or how many metric tons
of co2 they produce so long as they
deliver their expected shareholder
return without values to guide them the
dedicated pursuit of purpose can very
easily become a singular pursuit of
profit an ambitious vision while awesome
and awe-inspiring is necessary but
insufficient to sustain future progress
cataloging your values along with your
vision can help you hone in on your why
when you add your values to your vision
that’s where you find your purpose by
placing your values and vision at the
heart of your life and work you start to
create that moral compass to help you
manifest the change you wish to see in
the world by prioritizing your higher
purpose in this way you can play a
pivotal role
in reshaping the whole of humanity so
take out a pen or your preferred writing
device it can be your phone and write
down the biggest challenge that you see
confronting humanity the thing that
really keeps you up at night
maybe it’s climate change or gender
equity education or health perhaps it’s
treating a specific disease or helping
small businesses in your community you
name it that’s the problem your most
passionate about now consider how you
personally want to make a dent in that
wall here’s a hint what’s the thing
people have been telling you you’d be
great at your whole life but you have
always insisted on putting your fingers
in your ears and saying no then consider
your eulogy how do you want to be
remembered for some of you this may be
crystal clear right away it’s okay if
it’s not take the time to think it
through this is how we get closer to the
vision of the change we want to be in
the world then begin to catalog your
values what are the core truths you live
by is it honesty
curiosity gumption voice compassion
patience collaboration courage there’s
no one right answer to this question
each of us have personal values that
guide our lives and work when you write
them down and explain what they mean to
you you sparked you start to build that
moral compass your purpose that will
guide you on life’s long and winding
journey our world doesn’t always look
kindly on such brash moral vision when
efficiency productivity and share price
are king it can be hard to defy the
status quo and nobody likes going first
but daring to go boldly in a new
direction to accept risks that others
might not – unequivocally reject the
fear that holds so many of us back and
to unapologetically commit to our values
to stand up
what we believe in that’s the hard work
that really pays off
I think of irelia and her fearlessness
in the face of improbable odds or Tibby
and his eagerness to receive support
from someone more experienced than he
was or Charles and his deep-seated
commitment to his values vision
imagination persistence purpose that’s
the reason I’m here I hope that’s the
reason you are – thank you
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