How to Empower and Delegate: The Power of Shared Purpose | THEN to NOW Leadership Shift#4: Eyes On, Hands Off
To understand the power of shared purpose, we don’t have to look further than Ukraine. Ukraine’s success in fighting back a much mightier Russian army is in large part explained by their clarity of shared purpose that unites the nation: defend our home country, no matter the cost.
But you don’t have to fight a war to benefit from shared purpose. To truly empower your people and to delegate to those best suited for the job, your team requires clarity about your shared purpose. When you have clarity of shared purpose, you shift your team from working for the leader to working for the shared purpose.
Your shared purpose should be simple and tangible with clear marching orders for all your team members. Leading with your hands off through clarity of shared purpose is in this way leading like a compass, showing true north versus providing a detailed map on how to get there.
Here are a few examples of shared purposes of teams I have been or am a part of:
Investment advising firm (team size: 60)
To empower our clients to invest wisely and live fully
UN Nations military observer group, Lebanon (team size: 100)
To observe, monitor, report and/or investigate all incidents that are or could lead to a violation of UN Security Council Resolution 1701.
CEO peer performance group/Vistage model (team size: 12)
To support and challenge each other so that we may all reach and exceed our full potential as CEOs.
Two-man 530-mile Race Across Oregon Team (team size: 8)
Safely win the race and beat the course record. Safety=Speed.
Executive team of the Family Association (or PTA) of my boys’ school (team size: 15)
To provide leadership that nurtures a spirit of community between the school and its families and among families.
Every team, no matter its size or tenure, needs a shared purpose, and it is your job as the leader to make the shared purpose explicit and then relentlessly communicate it across your teams.
While the process of arriving at shared purpose takes some thoughtfulness, don’t sink too much time into it. Two to three brainstorming sessions with your team are sufficient. Unlike a vision or a mission, your shared purpose can change more frequently over time. This is because shared purpose gives your team immediate guidance for how to run a specific phase or project in your business.
How do you arrive at shared purpose? Ask, discuss and answer this very simple but powerful question together with your team: “What is the one most important thing we need to do extraordinary well around here to win? What is the one thing?” That one thing becomes your shared purpose.
Your Action: I will introduce the concept of shared purpose to my team on ______________________(date) and then lead a team discussion to arrive at shared purpose on_______________________________ (date).
