Every organisation has a 'why', and a separate 'vision', says Simon Sinek, Optimist and Founder of Simon Sinek Inc., who has authored several books about organisational 'why's. During a chat with Dirk-Peter van Leeuwen, Senior VP and GM, APAC, Red Hat during the Red Hat Asia Pacific Forum 2020, Sinek explained the difference:
"A why comes from the past. It is functionally an origin story.. it never changes for your entire life," he said. "A vision is a statement of the future, it's where you are going. You don't get to choose your own 'why' but you get to choose your own vision."
According to Sinek, the advantage of talking about the 'why' is that it allows organisations to communicate their values, but the vision inspires employees to see beyond the immediate impact of their work.
Both Sinek and van Leeuwen agree that the long-term impact of COVID-19 is still unknown, with Sinek saying that functioning in less than ideal conditions could still be unhealthy. What organisations can do however is maintain their vision.
"What's more important is a direction," Sinek offered, describing a vision as being like people in the dark with a speck of light in a distant corner that everyone can move to. "We're still groping in the dark, but all moving in a direction. That's what a 100-year plan looks like – great organisations have a 100-year plan. It sets the organisation on a distant path that's called vision. It allows for adaptability and it allows for a direction."
Sinek wrote a book called The Infinite Game where the concepts are explained further. He also spoke about leaders who have a finite mindset of being No. 1, when the game of business survival is infinite, and thus lacks a finish line. "We should learn to play for the game we are actually in," he said. "Constant improvement is important. The only true competitor in the infinite game is ourselves."
People with a finite mindset rely on thinking from the past. They hate uncertainty, and like quarterly and annual milestones because of the predictability. Those with infinite mindsets embrace the uncertain, Sinek said. He said: "Infinite companies pretended that they were startups. The question is how do we deliver what we have to other people, and they literally ignored everything they used to do. They said 'all bets are off, everything is on the table', that is the value of an infinite mindset in a time of uncertainty."
Van Leeuwen commented that when COVID hit, Red Hat's first thought was empathy, and the company reacted accordingly. "(We thought) this is not the time to think about how to maximise our quarter," he said.
Sinek agreed that the human touch is important. “One hundred percent of employees are people. One hundred percent of customers and clients are people. One hundred percent of investors are people. If you don't understand people, you don't understand business,” he said. “The best organisations and leaders understand that it's about people.”
When people are comfortable, they are more willing to innovate, he said.
Another aspect of the human touch is how the current remote working workstyle has underscored how much we like spending time with each other. While organisations are still "functioning and still functional", staying wholly digital is a fantasy, he said, because that functionality relies on trusted relationships that have already been created.
"Good luck building those relationships with a new employee... it requires much more work to build trust without an office," he said. That trust is built up from micro-interactions which are now gone with a digital workstyle, he elaborated.
"Online we only have the meeting, we don't have the before, the after, the hallway, the lunch," he said. "We have to build in time just to have a huddle: lunch with colleagues, leaders have to pick up the phone and ask 'how are you'.. all of that has to be done prescriptively which is much more work. Even if you do that you still have to get together at least once a year, to shake hands, to break bread."
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