Working on Purpose

System Choreographers. These are the disruptive big picture generalists rule breakers that drive high impact system innovation. They comprise an emerging career breed that pushes innovation beyond simple products and incremental change. They are a passionate band of talent that help organizations confront the “wicked combination of urgent threats and exceptional opportunities.” In this episode, we meet a leading member championing the cause, Dan McClure.

We can choose to respond to whatever life serves up to us, no matter how grim, heart-breaking, or devastating. We can and, arguably, must develop resilience to help us deal with and grow from those experiences. And happily, humanity has an infinite wellspring always available to each of us in the endeavor. It comes in the form of the defiant power of the human spirit, which is man's capacity as a spiritual being to resist and brave whatever conditioning, circumstances or suffering he may face or endure. On the near eve of Thanksgiving, this episode peruses the importance of wandering through the darkness to find the light and celebrates the magnificence of what every human being can do and be in life when we summon the defiant power of the human spirit.

With the vision and dream to make logotherapy available officially in the MENA region, Daliya Zgheib founded LOGOTHERAPY MENA, a Meaning Centered Institution, which primary cause is to help people find meaning and purpose through logotherapy and existential analysis. Her vision of the institute is to build communities and empower individuals to undergo a fulfilled life primarily anchored on meaning and this through spreading the philosophy, teachings and practices of Logotherapy in the MENA region and reaching all the sectors of the community. This episode explores her goal to anchor the MENA region in meaning as a basis to build communities and overall nations.

What the world needs more than anything right now goes beyond a simple or even shared purpose. It needs to be a collective purpose, a single rocket ship we can all fuel, board, and navigate with, together. Unless every one of us, together, embrace the critical prioritization of the whole, our most well-intended efforts will continue to be undone by others choosing not to play along. And we certainly won’t meet the contracting timelines drawn by the crises we face. The LEAD WITH WE philosophy and approach build on previous notions of purpose-based capitalism, then thrusts it light-years forward, because this prescription calls for all of us to act on a single purpose. That’s our only hope for continued business relevance. For our very survival.

More than 60 percent of American adults report they feel isolated, with a similar trend in Europe. The consequences are dire for individuals and the businesses that employ them, manifesting in mental and physical illness, decreased productivity, and toxic workplaces. Workplace and social violence can also result from loneliness. The key to health is to increase your relational energy, which may also delightfully elevate your purpose.

Meet Ethne, where passion meets purpose. With a focus on social injustice, this dynamic organization is out to eliminate the double jeopardy of poverty and its manifestations that hinder the empowerment of women and children. Powered by the meaning underlying the word “ethne,” its name is a reminder that we are all called to lead meaningful lives, serving one another beyond the scope of our geographical constraints.

After nearly two years of havoc brought on by COVID-19 and blood, sweat, and tears of executives working to survive the ongoing pandemic, business owners are seeking guidance for reinvention and recovery. Customers have shifted purchasing behaviors, staff has turned over, markets have changed, and hybrid working models continue to challenge. This episode with turnaround expert Lisa Gable features her experience in leading organizations in times of dramatic change. She shares concrete tips for ensuring business continuity and ways to shift to help ensure future viability and growth.

The field and inquiry of purpose is about to take a whole new leap into the possible. By taking what we know of the physical world through the science of color, we can understand more about our internal would through color theory. Color can give us access to conscious and unconscious purpose. In this episode, we enjoy a fireside chat with Dr. Smith who has spent a lifetime researching and practicing leadership, organization and social systems development inside large and complex organizations like the World Bank and the United Nations. He lets us in on how he continued to discover and iterate his model based on purpose being the source of power and how it’s expressed in at least five dimensions. He also shares his ground-breaking additional lens through color theory to illuminate our purpose choice. Hearing the narration is rather like being taken on a tour of his fine mind, bearing witness to the unfoldment of his consciousness, while elevating our own understanding of the topic through a profoundly simple elegance.

Business can be such a force for good in the world, especially when it is consciously and purposefully crafted and executed. Building on a long career in technology, we learn in this inspiring and possibilities-blasting episode just how large-scale and multi-stakeholder enlivening business can be. Tune in to learn the birth story of Regenrus, a woman-owned, women-led, heart-centered and science-based social impact community. The company is guided by a sense of reverence for all life and a collaborative spirit. Its stakeholders share a sincere commitment to awakening a renewed way to achieve wellness, balance and joy while making a difference for people, animals and our planet.

After decades in pursuit of striving, working, competing, achieving, and accumulating, we can draw from wisdom and serenity in navigating our second half of life. In this deep and connecting conversation with two Sage-ing mentors, we discuss the newest frontier in human development to set a path and purpose for the boomer generation to complete life with fulfillment while creating a legacy.

At a time with ever increasing change and uncertainty, it is extremely challenging to set a course direction in business. As the pandemic has highlighted, successfully navigating this uncertainty can be the difference between success and failure. Yet, we humans are naturally wired to “wait and see” when uncertain of a way forward. In this episode, the authors of Provoke share how the best leaders move faster than their peers to identify and shape important inflection points. In short, they take action to provoke the future, rather than react to that which has been brought forth by others.

Samuel Cook learned a thing or two about how precious and fleeting life is during his tours serving in the US Army and losing a brother early. Those experiences instilled a steadfast determination to do all the things, with focus and intention, that both he and his early departed brother wanted for themselves. Add on a life-long study of history and teaching it, and today you have Samuel at the helm of SanityDesk. He and team are out to craft a better digital world in the otherwise “surveillance capitalism” world we live in where big tech takes our data and packages it without our consent. Behold the possibility of a future of free will, informed by choice, powered by conscious capitalism principles.

Behold a new frontier of organically grown thought leaders, courtesy of the philosophy and culture media outlet, Planksip. On this platform, emerging writers and thought leaders have the opportunity to literally sip on the planks of fellow members’ works, while each lifting the other in growth and inspiration. In this episode, founder Daniel Sanderson shares why he created this platform and his vision of what it can do to help launch and develop a whole new breed of philosophers and academics.

A call for human-centric organizations is in order, says Executive Advisor and Futurist Deborah Westphal. This new organization embraces the messiness and beauty of people, iterates policies and procedures, and constantly challenges and refines strategies and goals for both itself and all the stakeholders it serves. Human-centered organizations optimally balance technology, business, and people to create a human-centered future that lifts us all.

Natalie Benamou found her career of 29 years entirely altered when Covid hit. Her world came to a crashing halt when trade shows were cancelled right and left. Doors were swiftly closing everywhere. And that’s where the magic happened. In that vast, ever opening gap which Natalie then began to see as a window, she got quiet and listened for that which called her. She could then turn her passion of empowering and lifting women and express it as her purpose through the HerCsuite platform she created. We all need a hand up, with a steady diet of mentors and advisors to guide and empower our efforts. HerCsuite is Natalie’s hand up for women.

Much of what traditional diversity programs teach is wrong … and sometimes illegal. The EEOC said that our focus needs to be more on building skills so we can create an environment of workplace civility, which means focusing on such topics as trust, tolerance, and conflict resolution -- and not teaching about different cultures. No one should ever be denied an opportunity to work or be promoted, yet they often are due to bigotry and misguided diversity and inclusion policies. We’ll learn from a white, Anglo-Saxon protestant, straight guy that diversity, inclusion, and tolerance initiatives often miss their intended mark and what we can do to more effectively address them in the workplace.

In an age when people ache for meaning and purpose, there is a tremendous opportunity to connect with nature to let in its wonder. Doing so affords emotional and spiritual well-being and can awaken the path to purpose. In this episode, we learn from wildlife conservationist and journalist Swati Thiyagarajan the sheer magic available in the everyday nature around us. She helps us see that only when we love the planet we live on can we save it.

Lars Peter Niessen has managed to find a special niche most of us like to avoid – he’s got a knack for working productively in “messes” and has done so all over the world. His mission through the organization he has created and stewards is to see the crisis for what it really is and change the outcome. Critical to necessary change is often very uncomfortable truth, another unusual area he is adept at navigating. In this episode, we learn from this soft-spoken wizard how he blends truth and humanitarian efforts to enable agencies to make the world a better place for us all.

Most people lack the clarity of who they really are and seem to be in an endless search for a better job. And this is the problem; people are looking for a good job, the ideal job, instead of first figuring out their purpose, why they are here on earth. When you understand your purpose, the work you pursue becomes the channel through which you express that purpose. Purpose gives us crazy energy and courage. In this episode, we explore with a “Sweet Spot” Career Coach just how to go about putting our purpose to work.

People are yearning to tune in to their unique reason for being, desperately seeking ways to matter. Purpose is available to anyone, anywhere in the world, and when we discover and serve from it, we encounter unparalleled fulfillment and can make the difference worthy of our one, precious life. In this fireside conversation, a few of the women who authored their story in a soon-to-be-released anthology weigh in on why the world needs purpose and what can happen when we live from it. Ours is a collection of stories, from Australia to Zambia, featuring women of all ages, socioeconomic backgrounds, and areas of influence sharing our paths to discovering our purpose, finding ways to express our gifts, and in doing so, making contributions that better the world.