Putting your drive to work.
Having identified your own inner drive to get yourself going is one thing. Using that drive to put others into action is another story.
As with all my articles, I’d love to get feedback and a conversation going to hopefully learn more about the subject so we can better help changemakers build a financially and mentally sustainable business.
Example Case:
I recently worked with an early-stage startup which started as a startup within a big energy supplier but was quickly separated to run their own show (still backed by the energy supplier). This was the moment they approached me to help them out with their brand strategy and design. As I usually do, I first send different team members a Google form in which they answer a few basic brand questions without going too deep. In this case that meant their CMO (who also had a high position within the energy company), their CTO, the lead designer, and the lead marketer. As soon as I got that back I asked them to now put discuss their answers in a group and fill out the same form again and send it back to me. I then planned in a meeting to discuss their answers and to go deeper into the brand essence, values, mission, vision. It was very clear that the CMO overpowered all the others and appeared very convincing in his answers. So much so that the rest of the team believed his answers to be better than those of the others. The last form I send was pretty much a copy of the personal form answers of the CMO. Two things immediately stood out to me, he mentioned that the company was like a family, and his top value was entrepreneurship. I asked the lead designer and marketer whether they shared the same family feeling within the company. Their answer was a soft and careful no. I know it’s hard to start a business that feels like family, but it’s something that a lot of startup people like to say and express. It makes them sound cool and perhaps trusted. I quickly backed their careful no by explaining that not every company needs a family feel. Their business vision is to make every electric car in the world charge on sustainable energy. That is a fantastic aspiration to work on and to be a part of!
Perhaps the company doesn’t have a family feel, but the people working there were clearly passionate about their mission. They shared certain personal values, they all had a strong drive, to push their company forward and to be a leader in their category. Isn’t this shared drive much more important for the sustainability of their company than being able to tell clients and partners about how much like a family they feel? Aren’t perhaps these shared values what companies often look for when they talk about wanting to feel like a family? Perhaps these companies should look a little deeper into their individual drives and values and see which ones overlap.
Back to the story. The other thing that stood out to me was that they listed entrepreneurship as a core value. We’re talking about an early-stage startup, led by an experienced CMO, part of a large energy provider, and works with partners such as BMW and Tesla. To me, this felt like a perfect recipe for at least one person to call out entrepreneurship as a core value. Startups are all about entrepreneurship and innovation (which was also listed). Add a well trained CMO who understands that these famous brands, who are known for their innovation and entrepreneurship (Elon Musk is probably the most famous entrepreneur of our times) will share this value and it’s pretty clear that entrepreneurship should make the list. The mistake here is that this value was focused on external communication, not internal implementation. So my first question was, ok, if you value entrepreneurship so much, which obviously makes sense from an external perspective, how do you put this value into action within your company? Is everybody in the company given space to learn from mistakes, is there room to experiment and will there be systems put in place to support everybody in areas of ideation, experimenting, and validation. Can people initiate projects by themselves based on the impact and costs of the time and resources they expect they need? Can ask for guidance, instead of permission? This time a careful no came from the CMO. Entrepreneurship is probably what the CMO gave him his position, and he understands how much their partners value entrepreneurship. He is understandingly proud to share this personal value with these big brands. But his drive is not that of his colleagues. The CMO could be in it for the journey, but the designer might be in it for the impact. Maybe the journey of the company is more in line with the values of the CMO, it’s what drives him. Maybe the impact of the company is in line with the purpose of the designer, it’s what drives her.
As a company, they are driven to create a positive change to our environment and becoming a leader in their category. Creating positive environmental change and obtaining a position where they would be able to lead others to do the same was their goal. Every individual working there was clear on this, and they all had a drive that was fulfilled by one of these elements. Recognizing this meant the family feeling was not as important as they first thought, and entrepreneurship as a core value was not as important. The impact they want to make and being part of the team that creates this change was where their individual drives aligned. This is where their shared values would align. This is how we could put their individual drives to work.
I wrote this story to illustrate that as a company leader you will have a certain drive and vision to where to take the company, but you need to find clarity and alignment with your business to make this drive work. Finding clarity in your own drive makes it easier to communicate your values and find alignment with those who are willing to help you fulfill your mission. Being able to tell your drive clearly is part of your personal narrative and part of the story of your company. Showing (not just telling) people how you strategically put your drive into action through a shared purpose and clearly actionable values is how you nurture your culture and connect with your audience.
The thoughts I share through this publication come from personal experiences and a search for the meaning of Drive and to learn how we can help changemakers turn their drive into sustainable action. I write openly to reach out to people who are interested-, or more knowledgable in this or related subjects. I very much welcome any form of feedback or exchange of ideas to learn from each other.
