Is there room for heart in business? Should there be heart in business?
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He’d been burned before.
I carved out an hour for him on a Wednesday for coffee.
We sat outside in the corner of the deck. The weather was beautiful, and it would’ve been a sin to sit inside that day.
Usually when I take and set meetings, I have a very defined agenda. I’ll have a list of topics to tackle. We tackle them together, talk about what we’re going to do next, then go on about our day. This whole song and dance isn’t just fun, it’s efficient! Meetings with me almost never last more than 30 minutes.
This was sure to be an interesting meeting, because we didn’t have an agenda. There were no topics to cover, and we had a full hour blocked.
We said our hello’s, grabbed our coffee, and sat down.
That’s when I learned that he had been burned before.
“Where I came from, business and wealth are desired, but…”
I already knew where he was about to take his thoughts.
Turns out that he and I came from pretty similar situations: poor, disadvantaged neighborhoods, etc. We’ve all heard that narrative before. And if you’ve lived that narrative, then you too know exactly how he finished his sentence.
“Where I came from, business and wealth are desired, but people look down on that stuff because they don’t think they have what it takes to get it.”
“They expect it to be handed to them,” he continued. “They’re trapped by their own minds.”
Two hours later…
Our hour-long coffee break stretched to two hours, and we didn’t even notice.
We got so deep into conversation about business, money, and wealth that the time frame didn’t matter anymore. Our thoughts meant more to us than anything else we could’ve been doing.
There was one topic in particular that piqued our interest the most: culture.
Never underestimate the power of culture.
Your environment and the culture within it are incredibly influential in ways that we may not even notice.
When he and I talked about how we grew up, we agreed that our culture was something that has held so many of our childhood friends back. We realized that there were more people in our early days who didn’t even know what success was than there were people who wanted us to be successful.
And the things that made such a huge difference in our lives were the people who never let us think of anything other than living lives that matter.
But here’s the problem: it’s incredibly difficult to live a life that matters in a business culture that doesn’t matter to you.
Not all types of businesses have great cultures.
We have a tendency to make broad generalizations about business. If we’ve had one bad experience with a business, then it’s easy to sweep over the entire thing and say it’s bad. But of course, not all business is bad.
Really, most business is good.
Business serves a purpose: to provide solutions.
Purpose in business.
The purpose of business is to provide solutions.
That’s basic, but there can be more.
Business can serve a higher purpose, too, and it often does. There are many businesses that go far beyond the profits to serve a higher purpose. Often, these companies are also the companies noted for having great company cultures.
Think Zappos, Warby Parker, or TOMS Shoes.
Those two companies are large and doing great things, and there are many smaller businesses chipping in as well. Take my company as an example. My co-founder and I are both passionate about working with people in poverty and making blighted neighborhoods more livable. So we do a bunch of work with the “east side,” which is the most disadvantaged part of our city.
One of my clients has a great word–and a great conference–for companies that serve a high purpose: for-purpose businesses.
Here’s the thing to remember. The business itself doesn’t decide to serve a higher purpose; the people running the business makes that decision.
There’s room for heart in business.
We don’t have to look very far to see examples of heartless business practices. But the same goes for full-of-heart practices.
You may be working in a company that has a great culture, so that shouldn’t surprise you.
Then again, you may be working inside an insidious company. Trust me, there are options. Look, then leave.
Or maybe you’re working at a company that doesn’t have a horrible culture, but the culture sure isn’t great either. I’d say that most companies have cultures like this. They don’t even have an average culture; they just don’t talk about culture at all.
The companies that don’t think about culture are the ones that trap you. They’re not good or bad enough to force you to make a decision. They’re not bad enough to leave, or great enough to stay. They’re just there.
I’d argue that there’s special room inside those cultures to add some heart.
When it comes to having heart in business, I want to take the conversation a step further.
We’re supposed to have heart in business.
Does this all seem fluffy to you?
I admit, talking about this stuff can seem like it’s all pie in the sky.
But for-purpose businesses are real, and they’re operating all around you.
Heck, maybe you’re like me: a nice guy building one.
Keep building, my friend.
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Photo: Flickr/bark