Taking Companies On A Journey Of Purpose Transformation

At our purpose consultancy Conspiracy of Love, we take companies through a process of Purpose Transformation (much like companies went on a Digital Transformation twenty years ago). 

It involves three stages: Discovering Purpose, Designing Impact and Driving Transformation.

Getting these three stages right unlocks what we call ‘The Purpose Transformation Journey’: a powerful engine of growth and profitability, but now centered on them helping solve the social or environmental problems of the world.

Purpose Transformation: Discovering Purpose

It starts with helping companies reorient themselves around a powerful and compelling Purpose, Mission and Vision that unlocks potential in so many areas - like deeper employee engagement, or more powerful innovation that leads to business growth through societal impact. Some definitions: 

• Purpose is the ‘Why’, The higher order reason for a company’s existence that inspires action to profitably solve the problems of the world.

• Mission is the ‘What’, what the company does with excellence every day to achieve the Purpose. 

• Vision is the ‘Where’, the world that will be created if the Purpose and Mission are fulfilled. 

For instance, with the technology giant Akamai, we helped them articulate a Purpose around ‘helping billions of people, billions of times a day’ through their Mission of ‘powering and protecting life online’ towards their Vision of creating ‘a safer and more connected world’.

This lead to massively increased employee pride, a clearer message to their customers and stakeholders, and more clarity around their role in the world and society at large. 

With the Australian dairy giant A2 Milk, we crafted a Purpose around ‘Pioneering the future of dairy for good’, in keeping with its origins as a company rooted in research and its future in innovating in the dairy nutrition industry, to drive future market growth by solving the category’s biggest challenges.

Purpose Transformation: Designing Growth Through Impact

Once the overarching reason to exist has been established, the next step in the Transformation journey is to identify areas where the company can make a positive impact in the world in line with their business model - in keeping with the definition of Purpose by Professor Colin Mayer who said ‘the purpose of a company is to produce profitable solutions to problems of people and planet, while at the same time “not profiting from producing problems for people or planet.’

For instance, we helped our client Adidas explore investing in the social problem of access to sport. Their Purpose statement was ‘Through Sport we have the Power to Change Lives’. Taking this as a starting point, we asked the questions ‘Which lives and how?’ With over a billion people on the planet having barriers to playing sport, it represented an opportunity for the company to use all of its resources from marketing and advertising to employee volunteering and giving to product innovation to break down those barriers. And in doing so, it created a pathway to grow the business by introducing new customers who would be loyal to the brand.

Purpose Transformation: Turning Strategy into Story And Culture

Finally, to unlock the full, long-term value of purpose across all areas of the business, we help our clients leverage purpose as a driver for organizational transformation. We do this by helping companies envision what future they want to create not just for the world, but for the company in it. Based on that, we surface opportunities to purpose-align three key areas of each organization for the long term:

• People and culture: to create conviction

Inspiring the employees of the company to find their own personal Purpose, and find their deep connection to the Company Purpose is the secret sauce that separates a good Purpose-driven story from a great one. We do this through our transformational GPS to Purpose workshops which help employees ‘get in alignment with their assignment’ and find ways to channel their Purpose into internal or external initiatives. 

For instance, Employee Resource Groups (ERGs) are a great manifestation of Purpose in a culture that can help companies tap into the enthusiasm and passion of employees. We also help many companies infuse Purpose into their Talent Value Proposition (which includes not just recruiting, but the value proposition to existing employees as well). This covers everything from recruitment to retention, where it can have a powerful impact on reducing turnover, increasing engagement and acting as a beacon to attract purpose-driven talent.

• Strategy: to create clarity

Aligning strategy internally around the Purpose allows it to cascade into different business groups, local markets, and functions. We also help companies align their various internal initiatives (CSR, DEI, Sustainability) around the business case for Purpose, and help create impact measurement frameworks to ‘measure what you treasure’ and track progress versus transparent, timebound commitments (like ESG goals for instance). All of this allows a company to track the ROI of Purpose in a clear and compelling way.

• Story: to create a compelling narrative

Finally, Story becomes the medium by which to truly turn the culture of the company into a Purpose-driven one. It helps articulate the future the company wants to help create, in ways that inspires, aligns and empowers all stakeholders to engage in transformation as a means to get to that future. Whether it's the Purpose Story of the CEO to help inspire their employees, the Company Purpose story that she or he tells about how the company is benefiting society, or Purpose Awards to highlight shining examples of Employees living their individual purpose, collecting and sharing these stories with consumer-grade communications is the best way to keep the flame of Purpose alive in a company.

After this, the organization has everything it needs to unleash the Purpose Flywheel of growth: A clear and compelling North Star, the business case for profitably solving the problems of the world, and a culture that is inspired and motivated to take action. 

We’d love to help your company go on a journey of Purpose Transformation. Feel free to reach out to us to set up a time for us to talk further.