The ‘why’ factor is crucial to success. A feature story by Padma Iyer in the Weekend Australian’s Professional section some time ago now, discusses this proposition with Simon Sinek explored in his new book Start with Why.
Sinek discusses his concept of the “golden circle”, which features 3 concentric circles – the outermost is called the ‘what’, the middle circle is the ‘how’, and the innermost is the ‘why’.
The premise being that those people and organisations that keep the ‘why’ in view will achieve long lasting success.
It is a simple framework that Sinek puts forward, and one that makes perfect sense – if you don’t know why you are doing something, or why it is important, then getting the how and what right simply isn’t feasible. He argues that individuals who don’t know why they are doing what they’re doing will quickly tire of the work.
Organisations with a clear statement of ‘why’ have strong cultures that employees find easy to fit into. The best companies care about people. Sinek says the most valuable thing in a company is its people.
He says “Companies don’t make decisions, people make decisions, companies don’t merge, its always people doing business with people. So what fascinates me is the number of companies who put numbers before people. Yet the numbers won’t help you in hard times. The numbers won’t innovate. The numbers won’t find solutions to difficult problems. And the numbers won’t keep your customers.”
A point I particularly like and agree with is that Sinek finds it strange that many companies declare they put customers first. He says “Customers do not come first, people come first. Some of them buy from you, some of them work for you.”
As a young manager I recall my mentor telling me this same thing – if we take care of and respect our people, they will take care of and respect our customers. Our people come first.
And yet so many organisations aren’t taking care of their people, they are overloading them, putting barriers in their way, and leaving them without a clear ‘why’ factor. The focus of numbers, results, performance is hindered because people lack clarity of purpose and focus, and suffer from Information Overload.
This challenge is the subject of a White Paper I wrote a while ago which explores the causes of Information Overload and presents an approach to Managing Information Overload to help sustain high performance. We look at 8 aspects that allow individuals and organisations to take real action, not to just filter out unwanted information as so many approaches suggest, but to embrace information in new ways by using enhanced skills and methods.
At Mindwerx we focus on helping people to manage information overload with programs on such things as Reading with purpose, strategy and speed. Mind Mapping and Improved Memory are a vital skills as well, and of course FOCUS is a key message we convey in all our Critical & Creative Thinking programs.
Learn more about the professional development programs and team facilitation services we offer now…
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