Purpose

A real purpose is necessary for a business or an organisation, if it needs to survive in the long run. Hence the purpuse must be identified and it must be real, before the other thoughts apply.

A real purpose is a purpose, that inspires and motivates. It is a purpose, that can animate anyone to do a little extra. A real purpose can ignite a movement, because people wants to be a part of it, and because they want to spread it. A real purpose creates value at all levels.

There are several reasons, why purpose driven businesses or organisations have huge advantages compared to traditional ones.

An employee, who relates to a purpose, is far more motivated than an employee working primarily for money. This means less need for detailed control during everyday work. A motivated and inspired employee, who knows the purpose of the task, solves it creatively and efficiently and delivers the right result. Less control creates increased freedom, which in turn creates happier employees. This decreases absence and influences positively on the way the employee talks about the business or organisation to others. As a result of that, the organisation will appear increasingly attractive making recruitment of the best talent easier, faster and less expensive.

A real purpose influences widely on the perception of the organisation. All related persons, who finds the purpose appealing, will be prone to influence positively for the business or organisation in a wide variety of contexts. This could be customers, who wants to be associated with the purpose. It could be potential employees, who becomes atrracted by the purpose and may even want to work for a lower salary. It could be business partners, who want to be associeated with the purpose. Or even politicians could support the organisation, if the purpose is desireable in a wider perspective.

Maslows Hierachy of Needs is one of the keys to understand the importance of the purpose. A lot of people requests more than the basics; simply because they can. The lower needs are already fullfilled, so these people are now looking for respect, meaning and other higher needs. This is why they are willing to pay or deliver more, if it fullfills some of the higher needs. Human nature prioritizes social status higher than material status, when a certain level is already achieved.

Simon Sinek explains this better that anyone else in his book "Start with Why", in his TED talk and on his website www.startwithwhy.com

The effects of a real purpose is explained in greater details in the other thoughts, that also includes specific examples.

There is a preassure on all businesses and organisations. They need to find and define their purpose. If this purpose does not inspire or motivate, the organisations reason for existence is questionable, and chances are that it will eventually become obsolete.