Do You Lead With Purpose?

One of the many impacts of COVID has been a rise in the need to understand and connect with purpose in our work. As work becomes more challenging and our contexts more complex, it's not surprising that people are asking "Why are we doing this? Is it worth it?'

This links directly to the ‘T’ of the ROBUST principles that underpin Becoming AntiFragile - ‘Tackle the Infinite Game’.

Professor James P. Carse first proposed the idea of the infinite game in his 1987 book, Finite and Infinite Games: A Vision of Life as Play and Possibility. When we play the Infinite Game:

? Rather than winning the game, our goal is to keep the game going and keep playing.

? Rather than looking to bring the game to a conclusion, we facilitate the game and help to sustain it, to make it thrive and prosper.

? Rather than playing to protect, gain, or expand power, we play to our limitless strengths – our own and others’, in combination and collectively – to achieve outcomes that may be felt beyond our time playing.

Playing the Infinite Game requires a particular mindset; one holds a vision for contribution and the greater good, which takes us beyond ego to have a bigger impact in the world – beyond ourselves and beyond our lifetime.

And for leaders, this means we need a clear, compelling and collaborative vision of the purpose of the work that we do with our teams.

Recent research from McKinsey suggests that when an organisation’s purpose is aligned and activated with team members sense of purpose they are more loyal, engaged and willing to advocate for their organisation and are more likely to agree that their company’s purpose in having an impact on customers, employees, the organisation and society more broadly.

The challenge for senior leaders is not to think of this as something to be ‘ticked off’, but as ongoing dialogue that explores ways the team and organisation can bring its purpose to the world and have impact.

The problem is that whilst leaders think they are engaging team members in conversations about purpose, team members disagree.

In the same McKinsey research, 72% of senior leaders said they involved employees in the process of developing the organization’s purpose, yet only 56% of frontline employees agreed (and 29% disagreed).

It’s not surprising then, that the research also found that frontline employees were less likely than company leaders to say that the company’s purpose matters to them personally (72% versus 89%, respectively) or to say that they understand how their role contributes to purpose.

How are you Tackling the Infinite Game with your team?

Can you develop an AntiFragile mindset to help you create a clear, compelling and collaborate purpose and vision for your team?

To help you understand more, you can take the free AntiFragile Survey.

In less than 10 minutes, you’ll be able to safely and confidentially:

• find out where you are on the AntiFragile continuum and how you can use the ROBUST principles framework to remove fragility and Become AntiFragile;
• immediately see your results – including your levels of AntiFragile Energy, Attitudes and Mindsets and the impact this is having for your wellbeing and performance;
• download your personalised results report packed with tips and questions to help guide your Becoming AntiFragile journey

And I'd love to hear how you get on with Tackling the Infinite Game with your team.