Finding a culture of purpose in a universe of uncertainty

With NASA represented on the panel by Charu Esper, the oft-quoted adage about the NASA janitor asked by a passing JFK, “What’s your job, here?”, who answered “To put a man on the moon,” seemed particularly relevant in staking out the level of alignment on purpose we should all target within our organizations.

To this end, the essentiality of communication was unanimous among the panelists, yet the angles were interestingly different. Graham McLaughlin of Optum talked about the yin and yang of what is said—and unsaid—within an organization that helps make a culture. Karsten Vagner of Maven made the astute point that policies and regulations are another powerful way to communicate. I threw in with the importance of storytelling, pulling out my teenage love of Kurt Vonnegut and recommending the Man in Hole storyline as a tool for leaders at organizations of any stage.

And when asked “How can established companies have the same level of purpose and commitment that is often found in startups?”, I suggested that they act like a newly appointed creative director at an older fashion house and start looking through their archives to pull out stories and themes from the past to weave into the current vision.

It was NASA’s day though, having landed a rover on Mars just hours before the conference, and Charu wrapped up proceedings by sharing how NASA, incredibly, has a longtime employee who is highly motivated, working hard every day, and still going strong at the grand old age of 87. This level of commitment is surely the aspirational altitude that the rest of us should be looking to reach within our own organizations. So while creating a culture of purpose may not be actual rocket science (although I would argue that it requires a similar amount of thought, calculations and bold decisions to truly get right), it seems we can all learn some valuable lessons from the level of alignment on purpose that it takes to explore the cosmos.

You can read From Day One’s recap of our discussion here.