The New York Times features an interview with Guy Kawasaki, the cofounder of the Alltop news aggregation site, managing director of Garage Technology Ventures, and previously an Apple Fellow at Apple Computer, Inc. Guy is the author of nine books including Reality Check, The Art of the Start, Rules for Revolutionaries, How to Drive Your Competition Crazy, Selling the Dream, and The Macintosh Way.
Adam Bryant of the Times asks Guy about his best boss, and Guy shares his experience of working with Steve Jobs, “… I learned from Steve Jobs that people can change the world. Maybe we didn’t get 95 percent market share, but we did make the world a better place.”
This is critical for engaging employees. When “only 29% of employees are actively engaged in their jobs,” we as business owners and CEO’s need to provide a higher purpose for our employees. As a chair for Vistage, our mission is to be “Dedicated to Increasing the Effectiveness and Enhancing the Lives of Chief Executives.” On the days that I am tired or sick or don’t feel like working, I get in touch with my mission and go the extra mile. I believe that I can change the world by helping CEOs to become more effective. I know that as a CEO, Vistage helped to enhance my life and make me more effective.
So how do you create a sense of mission in a company?
Guy responds, “The foundation is the desire to make meaning in the world — to make the world a better place. We believed in the Mac division that we were making the world a better place by making people more creative and productive. Google, at its core, probably believes it’s making the world a better place by democratizing information. So it starts from this core of how you make meaning, which translates into some kind of physical product or service that actually delivers.”
What do you do to make the world a better place?
