Ask Not What [Your Company] Can Do for YOU
Gen X, the generation to which I belong, has been referred to as the “Lost Generation” because of the shifting societal values into which we were born, which led to a loss of faith in institutions such as marriage, government, churches, and synagogues. This loss of faith continued into our adult working lives, as the blue chip companies that provided our parents’ generation with life-time employment and generous pension plans transformed into veritable temp agencies that offered us the opportunity to work long hours as “at will” employees for a series of employers who, if we were lucky, promised to match our contributions to our 401(k) plans that would follow us from job to job. Little wonder that we became self-reliant, independent, and perhaps a tad cynical. This way of thinking is certainly not exclusive to Gen X, but perhaps more prevalent.
Contrast that with the sense of idealism and even calling experienced by those born in the Baby Boom generation. They were raised to believe all things were possible and they could change the world through marches, protests, and serving in the Peace Corps. It was to this Baby Boom generation President John F. Kennedy issued this stirring call to arms in his inaugural address:
In the long history of the world, only a few generations have been granted the role of defending freedom in its hour of maximum danger. I do not shrink from this responsibility—I welcome it. I do not believe that any of us would exchange places with any other people or any other generation. The energy, the faith, the devotion which we bring to this endeavor will light our country and all who serve it—and the glow from that fire can truly light the world.
And so, my fellow Americans: ask not what your country can do for you—ask what you can do for your country.
Although these words were spoken before I was born, they still give me goose bumps every time I hear them. Listen for yourself starting around 3:35, and see if you don’t find yourself asking as I did, “why don’t our leaders talk like that anymore?”
Gospel of Self-Actualization
Fast forward 60 years with me to an essay I recently read in the New York Times describing a very different world view than the one epitomized by President Kennedy. In “The Problem With Letting Therapy-Speak Invade Everything,” Dr. Tara Isabella Burton discusses how the “gospel of self-actualization” has become the dominant philosophy of our times, including in our workplaces. She notes that “the pursuit of private happiness has increasingly become culturally celebrated as the ultimate goal.” Dr. Burton concludes that we are taught to prioritize our “personal desires and individual longings” while obligations to others “are often framed as mere unpleasant circumstance, inimical to the solitary pursuit of our best life.”
Challenging the seemingly widespread adherence to this view, Dr. Burton goes on to warn that the current thinking that “the truest or most fundamental parts of our humanity can be found in our desires and not our obligations . . . risks cutting us off from one of the most important truths about being human: We are social animals,” who need connection “to really thrive and survive.”
As a leader and a leadership coach, I recognize that workplaces that ignore the individual needs and desires of their employees have lost any claim to loyalty in return. Still, I wonder if the real answer to Dr. Burton’s concerns can be provided by repurposing President Kennedy’s words for a new generation of workers struggling to find meaning in their work.
The Benefits of Purpose
Hear me out. I’m not suggesting that individuals ignore their individual needs in service to an impersonal institution that has no reciprocal obligations to them in return. History has shown such arrangements rarely work well either for the individuals or the institutions themselves.
Instead, I would suggest that authentic self-actualization, defined by noted psychologist Abraham Maslow as the desire to “become everything one is capable of becoming,” actually requires each of us to focus on something greater, which is outside of ourselves. Purpose, in other words.
Social scientists have identified a clear link between individual happiness and “purpose,” defined as “a stable and generalized intention to accomplish something that is at the same time meaningful to the self and consequential for the world beyond the self,” (Damon, Bronk, Mariano, 2003). Research by Aaron Hurst, Brandon Peele, and others has established that individuals who can identify their purpose in the workplace receive the following benefits:
More successful careers, including increased levels of income, leadership effectiveness (+63%), fulfillment (+64%), learning (2x), engagement (4x), and productivity (+175%)
Better health results, including 32% fewer doctor’s visits; better memory, executive function, mood (42%); and longer lives (+7 years)
More generally, stronger relationships inside and outside the workplace
Not only do individuals prosper when they focus on their purpose, so do their employers, with purpose-driven companies producing higher profit margins, greater innovation, dramatically higher equity values than their industry peers (12:1), greater employee tenure (+7.4 months), and more fulfilling working environments (+54%).
Given those results, why would you not want to work for a company that encourages you to find a purpose greater than yourself?
Finding Your Purpose
There are a number of fabulous books out there on how to find your purpose, and I’m happy to recommend my favorites if you’ll email me at mike.tooley@upstreamprinciples.com. If you want to get started finding your purpose immediately, however, here are three key ways to get started:
The first key is illustrated by another story involving President Kennedy, this one perhaps apocryphal. As the story goes, he was visiting NASA for the first time when he ran into a janitor mopping the hallway. When President Kennedy asked the man what he did for NASA, he replied without hesitation, “Why, I’m helping put a man on the moon.” By the end of the decade, the janitor and his colleagues succeeded beyond their wildest imaginations.
Like the janitor, discovering our purpose within our organization requires us to look for the bigger picture and see how we can fit within it. Another classic story along these lines involved an observer asking three bricklayers on a scaffold what they were doing. The first responded, “I’m laying bricks,” which was true enough. The second responded “I’m building a wall,” which was slightly more aspirational. The third bricklayer responded, “I’m building a cathedral to The Almighty.” Now that’s the spirit.
How can you see yourself building cathedrals in your workplace instead of just laying bricks?
The second key is to ask yourself what is the one thing you can do on your team that no one else can do, either as well as you or in the unique way you can, and then do more of that.
I have a colleague soon to be retiring who is not only an exceptional listener but also extraordinarily generous in giving others the spotlight. He uses these gifts both to help individual team members feel like they belong and to create an environment that is welcoming, inclusive, and fun. My colleague is talented and an unbelievably hard worker too, but his legacy will be in the unique way he makes others feel like they truly belong. What can your unique legacy be?
The third key is to ask yourself what is presently missing from your team and see what you can do to supply it. We talk a lot about culture today, including whether it’s “toxic” or “healthy,” and we tend to assign responsibility for the creation of the culture for those at the top of the organization. My experience, however, is that an organization’s culture is the atmosphere everyone breathes from AND contributes to through their individual actions, behaviors, and mindsets. What can you do differently to create a healthier culture on your team—one that is self-actualizing not only for you but for others breathing the same air?
Love Your Company Anyway
One of the wisest people I know has a saying that “you should never love something that can’t love you back,” which he regretfully has had reason to apply to his Green Bay Packers this season. On this rare occasion, I think I disagree with my friend—but only to say that you can and should love something that hasn’t loved you back (yet).
Loving something outside ourselves—whether it’s our company, country, or even family—creates something in us and for us that cannot be replicated by the most intense devotion to the gospel of self-actualization, regardless of whether that something immediately loves you back in response. An even wiser person once challenged his followers to love precisely those people who didn’t love them back if they truly wanted to be blessed, noting sagely: “For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same?” There is wisdom in finding hope in tax collectors—their potential is your gain!
While the Baby Boomers were the ones originally inspired by President Kennedy’s charge to find meaning through service to others, perhaps it’s time for Gen X, Millennial, and subsequent generations to stop asking what their companies can do for them and start asking what they can do for their companies.
If you’re looking for a coach who can help you find and create a greater sense of purpose in your workplace, contact me at mike.tooley@upstreamprinciples.com.
Mike Tooley is a Co-Founder with Upstream Principles LLC, a coaching and consulting firm dedicated to helping individuals, leaders, and teams go upstream to discover solutions for their leadership and employee development challenges. As a certified Leadership and Strengths Coach, Mike is committed to serve as a guide to help others discover, and live out, who they are designed to be.