How Positive Leadership can help us to find our purpose

Welcome to the third edition of my Positive Leadership & You newsletter! 

First of all, thank you for all your feedback on the last edition. I was super interested to hear your perspectives on what it really means to live life authentically and I’m pleased that it resonated with so many of you.

This month, we are focusing on purpose - why it matters, how it can change, and how you find it by staying true to what is important to you. 

I have some great learnings to share with you this month, with insights from my Positive Leadership podcast guests and a couple favorite authors of mine. As always, please be sure to let me know your thoughts. 

Me: Focusing on our personal growth, wellbeing and being positive with ourselves.

If personal growth means really looking inward and focusing on ways to be positive with who you are and how you can better yourself, then purpose is the guiding light. 

Whenever I consider the close connection between personal growth and purpose, I think of a quote from the American author Mark Twain (you may have heard me use it before). He says: 

I love it because, as humans, finding 'our why' is so important. Although it might not feel that easy to find, don't feel discouraged. One thing to remember is that creating a sense of purpose in life is not an outside-in ‘divine inspiration’ kind of thing. It is an inside-out evolving process. 

The story you have of your life is likely to change over time. And it does not have to be complex. For example, when I spoke to Kevin Johnson on my podcast, who was the CEO of Starbucks, he told me that his purpose was simple. He wants to do things that are joyful, with people he loves. It can be that simple, but it is still so powerful.

You can listen to the episode with Kevin here. 

When I consider why finding your purpose is so important, I find myself thinking of one of my favorite books: The Second Mountain by David Brooks. 

Brooks looks at the way many people climb their first mountain: they pursue a career, acquire skills, support their families, and achieve success, then they look around and find the view unsatisfactory, or at least unfulfilling. They realize, this wasn’t my mountain after all; there’s another, bigger mountain that is actually my mountain, which has relationship, commitment, and the desires of the heart and soul at the center. 

I encourage you to read it, but while you find a copy, I have three takeaways to share with you:

• Individualism undermines our social connections, which leads to people feeling adrift as they focus on the first mountain, which is material success.
• We receive joy when we scale the second mountain: a life of caring for people. And joy is better than happiness! 
• Putting the needs of others above your own requires commitment and hard work, love alone is not enough. 

Me & Others: Connecting with and empowering others to achieve more.

Once you start thinking about who I want to serve, rather than who I want to be, you have taken the first step to becoming a positive leader who makes a real impact on others. 

I’ve had the privilege of meeting some of the world’s most inspiring leaders who have climbed these second mountains. 

Here are three tips from some of my podcast conversations so far: 

• Vincent Stanley, Director of Philosophy at Patagonia:

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“If you really want to build a purpose-led business model from scratch as a company, be brave enough to know what you are doing and the impact you have. Stop doing the bad things you do immediately, and learn and share practices from others and even unlearn things that you've done for so many years that need to stop.” 

• Satya Nadella, Chairman & CEO at Microsoft:

“…don’t wait for your next job to do your best work. Try to define what you’re doing in the broadest way, because it creates so much energy for yourself, that then you create energy around it, and in some sense, it propels you forward towards your goal.” 

• Jeroo Billimoria, Social Entrepreneur:

“Be happy, be crazy, have passion, bring a strategy, and persevere all the time, and then you will grow as a change maker in the world.” 

Me & the World: Having a positive impact on the world.  

Of course, when we find our purpose and live with it, we can make a difference for those around us, and change the world for the better.

Last month, I had the honor of talking to two incredible leaders: Sir Ronald Cohen , or Ronnie, known as “The Father of Impact Investment”, and Dr Clara Guila Kessous, a human rights activist, executive coach, and an appointed UNESCO Artist for Peace. 

At a first glance, it’s clear that they both come from very different fields, with Ronnie having spent a long career in business and Dr Kessous in academia and theatre. But both are united by a fascination with changing the world through living their purpose. 

Here are the top quotes from the episodes: 

From Ronnie: 

• On capitalism: “Companies that are the major force creating problems today environmentally and socially. And so changing their behavior, it's the way forward for us all… to change our economic system, we have to drive capitalism to optimize, not just risk and return, but risk, return and impact.” 
• On fulfilment: “Fulfilment comes from a balance between what you do for yourself and what you do for others. It isn't our duty to solve everything. It's our duty to start the process of solving everything.” 

From Dr Kessous: 

• On leadership: “Leaders are only leaders thanks to their followers. So, a positive leader is someone who creates positive followership, which means that in his way of standing up, in his courage and in his capacity to carry the collective, he will succeed in creating momentum that will carry people towards something that is of the order of a better collective… It is not an act of egocentricism, on the contrary, it speaks on behalf of others, for others.” 

I thoroughly enjoyed our conversations and really hope you do too. Listen to the full episode below to hear all the stories and advice from Ronnie. 

For any French speakers like me, you can also listen to my full conversation with Dr Kessous here. 

That’s it for another month, but before I go, remember: discovering your purpose is a journey, and it can change as easily as you yourself change and embrace new opportunities, challenges and priorities. 

See you soon. 

-jp