Why People — and Companies — Need Purpose

HBR IdeaCast

Harvard Business Review

Leadership, Entrepreneurship, Communication, Marketing, Business, Business/management, Management, Business/marketing, Business/entrepreneurship, Innovation, Hbr, Strategy, Economics, Finance, Teams, Harvard

4.4 • 1.9K Ratings

🗓️ 9 April 2019

⏱️ 25 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Nicholas Pearce, clinical associate professor at Kellogg School of Management, says too many companies and individuals go about their daily business without a strong sense of purpose. He argues that companies that are not simply profit-driven are more likely to succeed and that the same goes for people. He says individuals who align their daily job with their life’s work will be happier and more productive. Pearce is also a pastor, an executive coach, and the author of the book "The Purpose Path: A Guide to Pursuing Your Authentic Life's Work."

Transcript

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0:00.0	When leadership advice feels like buzzwords and platitudes, it's time to get real.
0:05.9	HPR's podcast Coaching Real Leaders brings you behind closed doors as Muriel Wilkins coaches anonymous
0:11.9	leaders through raw honest career questions
0:14.6	that we all face.
0:15.9	Listen and follow coaching real leaders for free
0:18.3	wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome to the HBR Ideacast from Harvard Business Review. I'm Kurt Nicki.
0:37.0	I'm Kurt Nicki. Nicholas Pierce didn't always know the path that he was meant for. He grew up on
0:49.8	the south side of Chicago. He was good at chemistry and math, he graduated near the top of his high school
0:54.8	class. At MIT, he studied chemical engineering, but along the way he realized that wasn't
1:01.4	what he was passionate about. He really cared about people.
1:05.3	He began to focus on engineering something else, leadership and organizational success.
1:11.4	Pierce is now a professor at Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern
1:15.6	University. He's also a pastor in a big Chicago church and an executive coach.
1:20.9	He has three jobs but one vocation as he describes it.
1:25.1	All those roles add up to a fulfilling life and he says that too many of us are
1:30.6	looking for jobs without thinking about purpose.
1:34.4	He says companies as well should be as purpose driven as they are profit driven.
1:39.3	His new book is The Purpose Path, a guide to pursuing your authentic life's work.
1:44.4	Nicholas, thanks for coming on the show.
1:46.4	Thanks for having me, Kurt. If you take maybe as a given that the most successful companies are purpose driven or have a clear mission,
2:01.0	do the people who work for them also have that too?
2:06.6	The best companies are ones that not only have a purpose for themselves, but also attract and hire people whose individual senses of purpose align with the
	...

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