Are you telling a money story or a meaning story?

Lisa Earle Mcleod
Lisa Earle Mcleod

What's the purpose of your job? It's the question that determines how you perceive your work, and, in many cases, your life.

We all have a story about our job. The story we tell ourselves about work creates our beliefs, which informs our attitude, which drives our behavior, which creates our performance.

At work we tend to focus on skill. Skill matters, but so does story. For example, imagine two airplane pilots. Both are equally skilled and have equal experience. Pilot A is a good pilot. He believes that the purpose of his job is to make money. He does his job well and he gets paid well. The story he tells himself is, I go to work so I can afford nice things for my family and myself.

Pilot B is an equally good pilot. She believes that her purpose is to get her passengers there safely. She makes the exact same amount of money as Pilot A, and she likes to buy nice things and provide for her family. But that's not her primary story. When she goes to work the story she tells herself is, "My job is to get these precious people – mothers, fathers, daughters, brothers – to their destinations safely."

Whose plane would you rather fly on? Who would you feel more confident to have in the cockpit during a storm? The answer is obvious; we want to fly with a skilled pilot who believes we are precious and that her job is to get us there safely.

A great story will not compensate for lack of skill. But when you add meaning to skill, you achieve higher levels of performance. A meaningful story about your job benefits customers and your company.

But let's think about this from the pilots' perspective. Which pilot do you think experiences more satisfaction in their job? Which pilot is more proud to tell their kids about their work? Which pilot is better able to handle stress on difficult days? The one who tells themselves a money story, or the pilot who has a meaning story?

Infusing your work with meaning makes you better at your job and it also improves your own emotional engagement.

Creating a meaning story is the lynchpin for creating an exceptional organization. Consider the case of our client Blackbaud, and their CEO Mike Gianoni, who I recently profiled for Forbes.com.

Blackbaud provides software and services for the global philanthropic community. When Mike Gianoni took over as President CEO in January of 2014, Blackbaud's stock price was declining and earnings were flat. They were seeing early indications that customers were frustrated with lack of updates to their products. Contracts that were once secure were going out for bids.

Most CEOs would have jumped in to rally their team around increasing revenue. Gianoni chose a different focus. Instead of focusing on the money, Gianoni focused on the meaning. He brought in customers to talk about the impact Blackbaud's products had on their organizations. He showed Blackbaud's developers, finance, customer service teams how their jobs enabled people to do more good in the world.

With our help, Gianoni and his team shifted from a money story to a meaning story. Did they become a low-performing feel good company? Hardly. During Gianoni's first two years at Blackbaud he doubled the stock price, driving share price from $33 to $67 and increased revenue from $504 million to $638 million.

Ironic isn't it? Money or meaning, which story would serve you better?

Lisa McLeod is the creator of the popular business concept Noble Purpose and author of the bestseller, Selling with Noble Purpose.

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