One Year of Well Purposed

What better way to celebrate the first year of Well Purposed with:

• A wrap-up of the top 3 newsletters of the year
• An announcement of a new series coming in early 2025
• An opportunity for you to input into Well Purposed

Have your input into Well Purposed

Well Purposed started as a channel to share the insights and resources I gained through a decade of leading Healthy Nibbles. However, very quickly, it transitioned from a cathartic exercise following the closure of the business, to having its own unique purpose. To inspire, encourage and support entrepreneurs, innovators and creators to build both profitably, and purposefully.

Taking stock of the journey over the last year from newsletter to content and consultancy, now requires some insight from you. It will only take a few minutes (unless you choose to write an essay). But anything you do add, will be gratefully received.

Well Purposed Annual Feedback

Starting 2025 with a Series

Is entrepreneurship bad for your health?

Entrepreneurs often view the scale up journey through rose tinted glasses:

???A creator of wealth

???Provider of flexibility

???Delivering career-defining moments

But is it all it's cracked up to be?

In reality, you will soon discover a world of extremes.

???A-star team, versus team issues to make you cringe

???Smashing revenue/profit targets, or wondering how you will make ends meet

???Securing funding, or being rejected by hundreds of funds

???Working remotely (usually in some tropical location), versus not taking a break for years

It is easy to see how entrepreneurship and mental health issues are so closely linked. In 2025 Well Purposed is going to be releasing a series within the biweekly newsletter, focusing on the unspoken aspects of entrepreneurship - health, wellbeing, identity, family.

Founders, it's time to leave comparison, strife, and fear behind to pursue your purpose.

Those starting out, with a seed of a vision, feeling inferior to established founders. Established founders fearful of investor or stakeholder pressure, or that they are not growing at the expected speed. Internal striving to reach goals, metrics, or internal perception of success.

“We tend to stack ourselves up against everyone else and pick ourselves apart based on what other people are doing. This practice does nothing to make us better” Cara Alwill Leyba - Girl Code

But here's the challenge.

We’re living in a world that’s changing faster than we realise, and it’s on us—the entrepreneurs, the dreamers, the doers and innovators—to step up and create solutions.

If we're caught in the trap of comparing ourselves to a few snapshots of someone else's life; which never truly reveals the full story of hidden failures, challenges and pain, we become distracted and less able to focus on our intended path and vision.

In other words, innovation stops.

The only healthy approach is to compare yourself to your past self. Reflect on who you are today versus who you were before, or assess your business’s current performance against its performance in previous days, weeks, months, or years.

This provides a realistic benchmark where you have sight of all the facts.

There are tools and techniques to help you with a mindset shift.

1. Understand that entrepreneurship is a personal journey. We're building different products, with different business models. Some models can be tackled with the 'fail fast fail cheap' approach, other ventures need founders to be present for the long haul. Personal circumstances vary as wildly as the individuals that are founders.
2. Journaling is your quiet companion. Not simply journaling, but benchmarking your goals and aspirations annually, broken into quarterly and weekly achievements is crucial to seeing progress. I use Full Focus Planner, but my top tip, is to find a tool that works for you.
3. Find a mentor. Look for real entrepreneurs in your network who you can talk to who are where you want to be, but are willing to be your mentor and share their journey with you, both with the challenges they’ve experienced as well as what they’ve learned along the way.

Know that we all face days when we feel we have achieved less than we should.

But if you dive into our journal, or grab a coffee with a mentor, rather than mindlessly scrolling in a bid to compare, you will be saner, stronger and more focussed.

The True Value of Authentic Customer Experiences

As a founder and leader, I’ve always advocated for intuitive and authentic customer experiences. My journey through building brand experiences has sharpened my eye for genuine service. It’s the subtle nuances that often speak volumes about a brand’s commitment to its values.

It’s a common pitfall for founders to become engrossed in product development at the expense of customer service. This misstep can lead to failing to meet brand expectations and, ultimately, a costly loss in the long run.

A Tale of Two Experiences

Let me illustrate with two contrasting experiences:

The BoTree, London is the epitome of hospitality. Led by values of “Truth, Love and Compassion" the team are focused on minimising their impact on the planet, whilst creating an environment in which guests, team, and community can connect, be inspired, and flourish.

From the minute you step into the hotel, to the personalised welcome by your floor host, the hotel, its ambiance, and people create an environment that exudes hospitality.

Why Does This Matter?

The implications are significant, both socially and commercially. Repeat business, corporate travel, and positive referrals all contribute to increased revenue, brand loyalty, and endorsements.

Disappointing Encounters with Established Brands

Conversely, I’ve recently encountered disappointment with brands I’ve been loyal to for years. A cosmetic and skincare brand, known for its commitment to conservation and sustainability, fell short when a product’s packaging failed, compromising the product’s integrity. The ensuing blame game between the retailer and the brand left me, the customer, in limbo. Despite reaching out to the brand’s PR via LinkedIn, I’m still awaiting a response that aligns with their proclaimed values.

Building your Business Through Customer Experience

These experiences underscore the importance of consistent, authentic customer service. It’s not just about the immediate transaction but about building a legacy of trust and excellence that resonates with customers long after they’ve left your establishment.

• Establish values that you embrace, live by, and are authentic to your brand.
• Recruit based on your values, and NEVER overlook the post-recruitment period. New hires need to see the brand lived and delivered, in action, every day.
• Complaints come with the territory of owning a business. They are an opportunity to learn, have dialogue with the customer and will end in one of two ways - an elated customer who feels important, or a frustrated and disappointed customer.

Have you experienced exceptional or disappointing customer experience? How did it make you feel?

Workplace Wellbeing Demands Pioneering Leadership.

According to Gallup disengaged employees are currently costing the global economy $8.8 trillion. Equally stark is the evidence that only 9% of the workforce engages with wellbeing initiatives at work. This is despite an engaged workforce delivering:

?10% higher customer loyalty

?23% higher profitability

?18% higher productivity (sales)

?18% lower turnover for high-turnover organisations

?43% lower turnover for low-turnover organisations

With stats like these, workplace wellbeing should be a no-brainer, but it isn't.

Instead, wellbeing has been over-complicated, mis-represented, made fraught by time, organisational and financial constraints (in already high pressure business environments). In short, workplace wellbeing needs simplifying, being owned and implemented by a leader, who is prepared to lead.

Within a business, teamwork is akin to playing a symphony. Every employee plays their part as if they were a member of a world-class orchestra, with each note precisely timed and harmoniously coordinated by a conductor, the leader (more on this below).

Part of the leaders role is to ensure the team are supported in an environment of trust, where clear communication, care and direction is evident. This is the foundation of business. A two-way trusted environment opens up the opportunity for dialogue, to understand expectations for wellbeing; from both the perspective of the leaders and employees. By way of a contrived example, there is little point hosting out of hours group workouts if the majority of your team are parents and need flexibility.

Ahead of designing new wellbeing interventions for 2024, first do a health check on the business. Do you have a healthy culture, a leader who is willing to lead and the care and attention to make interventions relevant and welcome to the majority.

Taking a step back, ahead of moving forwards may just create the best working environment you can envisage!

#Entrepreneurship #Impact #JustSaraRoberts

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PS: Follow me Sara Roberts for insights into health, leadership and entrepreneurship led by impact, as much as profitability

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PPS: Want to learn more about health, and impact led leadership and entrepreneurship? Subscribe to Well Purposed, issued on the 1st and 15th of each month.