Why Make Meaningful Work?

People spend considerable amounts of their time at work in projects that have little value.

Projects are part of a larger system we call “work”.

Sometimes people feel work is :

• Wasteful
• Unhealthy
• Purposeless
• Stressful

So what is the overall impact on people at work?

Sleepwalking

What can sleepwalking feel like at work?

• Frustrated
• Limited choices
• Busy
• No time to think
• No energy
• Numb

How can WE :

Make practices to contribute to the intention of wellness for people, work, projects, communities and economies for an enlightened future society?

We do this by creating:

• Trusting work environments.

In order to strengthen trust in work environments, we need to gain perspectives to see more widely and deeply by:

• Listening to other perspectives.
• Probing for what you may not see.
• Zooming out to gain perspectives.
• Zooming in on the details paired with the bigger picture.

And then to share and clarify perspective by:

• Confronting the issues to help solve problems.
• Connecting the dots to gain focus.

Finally to define meaning based on perspectives and know what to work and why by:

• Prioritising on what to work on.
• Focusing on what to work on and it’s meaning.

Using these example practices, we need YOUR help to answer :

How can we make meaningful work?

What if you …

• Possess all the social permission you need to change personal habits?
• Spent an hour of everyday examining the potential for significance of a project?
• Began listening to and imploring others for their motives rather than their threats?
• Replace “what do I stand to lose?” with “what might we all need to gain?”
• Openly discussed the projects you work on mattered and where the best work felt like play and the best play felt like work?
• Welcomed all disciplines to create a broader ‘community of aspiration’ and signed an implicit contract to make meaningful work for every project we put our hands to?

Calls to action
This is a hard question to answer and so WE will help to:

• Write articles about this question of — how can we make meaningful work?
• Use the articles to contribute to key themes
• Invite experts from a range of domains who can write about key themes
• Use the key themes to contribute directly to practices
• Use the practices to contribute to an integrated practice as part of continuous learning
• Organise events globally to help discuss frustrations that can lead to #sleepwalking and opportunities that can lead to #sparkle

You can, in the meantime, join in the conversation going forward and let us know if you have any questions.

Thank you,

Dan & Jo
Founders