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Discovering You Leadership Purpose

Discovering Your Leadership Purpose

We frequently talk about purpose in the context of individuals or organizations, but there are other areas where identification and understanding of purpose is critical. One such instance is in the context of leadership, and Isadore Sharp, founder and Chairman of the iconic Four Seasons Hotel brand provides a great example.

Sharp finished college with an architecture degree and joined his father’s construction business in the Toronto area. After building several motor hotels, he recognized that his passion lay not in constructing and owning hotel buildings, but in providing a premier guest experience and level of customer service.  He wanted to “welcome customers and treat them like guests coming into our home.” 1  So Sharp shifted from being a hotel owner-operator into managing hotel properties. His priority is a commitment to the Golden Rule, where employees and guests alike are treated with respect. Along the way he had to examine the behavior of his senior leadership team and part company with those who couldn’t lead by example. As a result, with 96 properties in 41 countries and annual revenues in excess of $4B, both customer and employee retention is high, and they’ve been on the list of 100 Best Places to Work for 18 consecutive years.

Sharp understands that his leadership purpose was to provide a premier level of hospitality and service. And over time, he recognized the importance of building the right team around him, whose perfomance aligned with that purpose. He fulfills his purpose based on leadership strengths of treating guests with respect and sincerity, and providing the right location and environment for a first class stay. He consistently embeds it into every aspect of his organization’s processes, rewards and behaviors; and believes that a true leader influences not from a position of power, but from a position of respect.2  His leadership purpose and strengths, then work together to accomplish his leadership goal of generating a reasonable profit that benefits the company, hotel owners, customers and employees.

Leadership purpose forms the “why” of your leadership. Are you seeking a leadership role simply because of the power, position, people or profits? Or are you leading because of the purpose, mission and vision that you are pursuing, no matter the size of the role? Leadership strengths are the capabilities and critical success factors necessary to operate in your purpose. And leadership goals are the results you accomplish in your work. (more…)

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Butterfly Faith

Butterfly Faith

In the early 1960s, meteorologist Edward Lorenz presented his scientific findings that a “small change at one place in a nonlinear system can result in large differences to a later state”[1]. This became known as The Butterfly Effect, or the law of sensitive dependence on initial conditions. Put simply, the theory is that a butterfly flapping its wings on one side of the earth can cause a hurricane in another part of the earth. Like a domino effect, the flapping of its wings sets wind currents in motion, which coupled with its position and a myriad of other factors and atmospheric conditions, can impact in the weather thousands of miles away. This small movement is barely enough to create a breeze felt by a human being, yet significant enough to create wind currents. A motion casually made, often taken for granted, yet it has a powerful impact.

The Butterfly Effect

I first learned about The Butterfly Effect from reading a short book of the same name written by Andy Andrews, a New York Times best-selling author. His point was to convey how much each person’s life matters, because of the impact it has on others. An action, a spoken word, a decision, that I perceive to be insignificant can have a ripple effect on millions of people, either positively or negatively.

Come to think of it, some of the most powerful and controlling forces are also the smallest ones.  The rudder on a ship is a small flat plane that directs the flow of water past it which in effect turns the ship

[2]. The tongue is a small part of our bodies, but when it speaks, it can start a war between nations, or kindle a great love between two people.A mustard seedis only 1-2 mm in diameter, yet Jesus said, if you have faith the size of a mustard seed, you can speak to a mountain and cause it to move (Matthew 17:20).Each are small objects, but with a powerful outcome. Well if each of these objects can have such a major impact on its surroundings, how can you use even a little bit of faith to impact your environment?Faith is “confidence or trust in a person or thing; belief that is not based on proof”[3].It’s the substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things not seen (Hebrews 11:1).

The Ripple Effect of Faith

As a faith centered leader, how can you exert your faith for a business goal, an organizational objective, or a team priority. How can you focus your thoughts, your intangible ideas and abstract wanderings, on a desired outcome with sufficient confidence that it will indeed come to pass? It’s simply a matter of perspective. Too often we’re caught up in the moment of a seemingly insurmountable challenge; our scope of sight is too limited; our belief in the future too vague. We fail to grasp the significance of the impact of our faith; mountain moving, hurricane creating faith.

My prayer for you today is that God will open the eyes of your spirit, granting you understanding and insight to see a future positive potential in yourself, your team, and your organization that you’ve never before grasped. That you will no longer accept what is, but you will instead believe what can be. That your faith will be as vast as the wind currents created by the rippling of a butterfly’s wings. That your faith will be strong enough to move mountains. That your faith will multiply your present resources. My prayer is that you will have the faith of a butterfly to set in motion actions that will cause a tsunami of blessings to people that you will never know, but by their very act will create a brighter future.


[1]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Butterfly_effect

[2]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rudder#Trim_tab

[3]www.dictionary.com. October 18, 2011

Photo courtesy of IStockphoto

Copyright 2011 Priscilla Archangel

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