Jim Whitt, Contributing Editor

What Do You Stand For?

A couple of years ago a copy of my book, Riding for the Brand: The Power of Purposeful Leadership , ended up in the hands of Southwest Airlines president Colleen Barrett. As a result, she invited me to speak to the Southwest Airlines culture committee — 200 plus employees from all levels, divisions and locations responsible for keeping the world-famous Southwest culture alive and well. After my presentation one of the attendees, Amy Lyon, asked that I give her a call. What’s interesting is that Ms. Lyon wasn’t a Southwest employee; she was there representing GSD&M Idea City, a communications and advertising firm that has worked with Southwest for nearly three decades.

I called Ms. Lyon and learned that GSD&M shares much in common with what we do at Purpose Unlimited. While we transform lives, leaders and organizations through the power of purpose, GSD&M helps clients market their organizations through the power of purpose. Roy Spence, GSD&M’s CEO, has written about this purpose-based approach in It’s Not What You Sell, It’s What You Stand For: Why Every Extraordinary Business is Driven by Purpose . And GSD&M has worked with some pretty extraordinary clients such as Southwest Airlines, Wal-Mart, Norwegian Cruise Lines, Charles Schwab and BMW.

GSD&M is truly unique in the world of advertising and public relations. They don’t just cook up a smorgasbord of ad campaigns for their clients but get to the heart of why the organization exists and start there to build the connection with the customer. I think their approach can be summed up in what Spence identifies as three interdependent components:

1. Building an organization that truly makes a difference in the marketplace;
2. Becoming a leader of great purpose; and
3. Bringing your purpose to life so that your constituents know exactly what you stand for.

“You need to be firing on all three cylinders to truly experience the power of purpose in the marketplace,” Spence says. I agree. These components are congruent with our approach to developing purpose-driven organizations: 1) In the old west, a brand not only identified a ranch’s cattle, it was a symbol of pride and loyalty for all of its cowboys — they rode for the brand. People today want to be partners in a cause that is purposeful, heroic, adventurous and idealistic. Like cowboys of yesteryear, they want to ride for the brand . 2) Great causes require purposeful leadership — people will follow leaders who live and breathe the organization’s purpose. 3) To bring that purpose to life, it must be positive, powerful, simple and serving . Do these things and it’s likely that people will know exactly what you stand for.

What about the bottom line? Roy Spence explains that purpose “goes beyond making money — and it almost always results in making more money than you ever thought possible.”

He cites research commissioned by Jim Stengel, former global marketing officer of Proctor & Gamble that included over 30,000 brands and focused on 25 top performers. The top performers shared a common denominator — they “were fulfilling a higher order purpose.” He also references the research from Built to Last by Jim Collins and Jerry Porras: “… organizations driven by purpose and values outperformed the general market 15 to 1 and outperformed comparison companies 6 to 1.”

I was a Southwest Airlines fan years before I was asked to speak to their culture committee, and they continue to be my first choice in flying. Before Southwest entered the not-so-friendly skies of commercial air travel, only 15 percent of Americans had flown. Airline seats were occupied by business travelers and those who had deep enough pockets to travel for pleasure. Southwest developed a business model that made flying affordable for the average person. The bottom line is that Southwest has made a profit in every quarter for the last 36 years. But the path they took to get there is a byproduct of fulfilling the company’s purpose — to give people the freedom to fly . Here’s the bottom line for the customer — today, over 85 percent of Americans have flown on a commercial airline.

A few years ago I was invited to speak at a Cargill meeting. While preparing for my presentation I learned that Cargill’s purpose is to be the world leader in nourishing people . At that meeting I saw that the people at Cargill were serious about that purpose and decided they were the kind of organization I wanted to work with. I picked up the phone and called Bryan McMurry, Cargill Animal Nutrition’s Beef Brand Manager. We talked specifically about how we could form what Cargill calls an enterprise relationship to promote and fulfill their purpose. I can tell you that this wasn’t just talk for Bryan; he’s a true believer in the power of purpose and he rides for the brand. That’s how Cargill became the sponsor for this column. Oh, let’s not forget the bottom line — Cargill is a very profitable company. They’re profitable because they’re doing a tremendous job of fulfilling their purpose of being the world leader in nourishing people.

You’ll find the process for making the purpose/profit connection in Riding for the Brand . Your brand and your purpose should be synonymous. Your purpose isn’t something you cook up because you think it will “sell” in an ad. We take an organization though a very involved process to help them identify their purpose. Once we do that, the next step is to brand it. For example, Cargill’s purpose of being the world leader in nourishing people is effectively branded above my head in the picture to the left as Cargill … Nourishing people . Just as your brand identifies your cattle, your purpose identifies your organization. That purpose represents what you stand for. If people like what you stand for, they will be attracted to you . People – customers, employees and partners — will want to ride for your brand.

What do you stand for? In today’s economic environment your success — if not your very survival — depends on you giving people a powerful reason to do business with you . The four P’s of marketing — product, price, place and promotion — aren’t nearly as important as the fifth P — purpose. It’s what drives extraordinary businesses.

Please e-mail comments to Jim Whitt at jim@purposeunlimited.com.

Cargill Animal Nutrition is proud to sponsor the “Whitt and Wisdom” column which offers business management and leadership advice from management consultant Jim Whitt. Cargill is an international provider of food, agricultural and risk management products and services.