Written by: Sandrine Gelin-Lamrani, Senior Level Executive Contributor
Executive Contributors at Brainz Magazine are handpicked and invited to contribute because of their knowledge and valuable insight within their area of expertise.
What is your venture’s overall big goal? Is it primarily about making a Meaningful Contribution to the World? Or is it about Achieving Greater Innovation and Resilience? If you are contemplating one of those business key outcomes, read on to discover what it will take for you to develop the business mindset aligned with your big goal.
Making an authentic and meaningful contribution to the world
Making a genuine and meaningful contribution to the world is increasingly becoming one of the entrepreneurs’ key big goal. It might be yours right now.
Today’s world is making its way through vast and rapid changes – climatic, social, economic, demographic, cultural... Young generations are taking the stand, valuing transparency, work-life balance, professional meaningful activities aligned with their purpose, more collaborative team approaches, etc. Consequently, companies’ focus is also shifting to include new key areas, such as overall sustainability, wellbeing, diversity & inclusion, emotional safety… sometimes showing an extraordinary appetite for change, enabled by quantum leap technological evolution.
If your business’ current main focus is about Contributing, you certainly have, as Anita Roddick put it, the drive to create “an honourable livelihood, where you take your skills, use them and earn a living from it,” in a way that “gives you a sense of freedom and allows you to balance your life the way you want.” You also probably have the deep desire to empower others and help them to be happy.
To develop your Contribution Mindset, you need to focus primarily on developing a product or service that truly benefits the world in general and your customers in particular. This materializes in a combination between your company’s “vision” and “mission”.
The Vision is about looking into the future to see what you want to create in the world through your venture. You need to be clear about your purpose and the unique gift and contribution that you bring to others. In essence, the Vision is the “Why” described by Simon Sinek, strongly related to our human being’s purpose. Typical Vision related questions to ask yourself are :
What do you want to see better or different in the world?
What do you want to see more of and less of in the future?
Taking the time to lay out your Vision is essential to make sure you know what you want to create in the longer-term future: “If you can dream it, you can do it”, as Walt Disney put it.
The Mission however is about turning your vision into reality. It’s the journey you are taking to materialize it. Essentially, the Mission is the “How” of your venture’s journey:
What problems are you solving? For whom?
What are the possible clients that would benefit from your vision?
What are your special gifts, resources, capabilities, activities and actions to making the vision happen?
Who do you need as team members in order to fulfill your mission and support your vision?
Taking the time to express your Mission is essential to know which direction you want to take, how you will go about making your vision a reality.
Achieving greater innovation and resilience
Achieving Greater Innovation and Resilience might be your business focus today, to make sure it strives (or survives) in the near future.
Achieving greater Innovation and Resilience means scanning for opportunities: developing the habit to consistently scan the horizon for possibilities and “weak signals” that indicate important opportunities, is done in many ways:
Constantly questioning the status quo: your company’s position with respect to others in your environment/market, the way to improve or make something differently, the team’s core competencies needed to be the company you need to be …
Constantly looking out to your market trends evolution: taking the time to observe what is going on in the world, keeping the conversations going with your overall environment – team members, clients, suppliers, partners, stake holders, etc.
Being aware of how you identify and seize opportunities: what is the process that unfolds for you to see, recognize, evaluate, go about opportunities that match your business model?
Achieving greater Innovation and Resilience also requires you to seek for frequent and honest feedback: it means that you have the habit in place and the means to get ongoing and relevant feedback. This is particularly important to avoid large problems and obstacles, and make course corrections, if necessary.
What are you doing to get relevant feedback?
What can you do to get more of it?
What type of feedback are you getting currently? What does that tell you?
Last but not least, you will also need to focus on increasing competencies within your team and leveraging synergies through partnerships and alliances with other ventures.
Overall, get inspired
“All great things begin with a vision… a dream… I’ve always believed that success comes from not letting your eyes stray from that target. Anyone who wants to achieve a dream must stay focused, strong, and steady.” Estée Lauder
« All successful people men and women are big dreamers. They imagine what their future could be, ideal in every respect, and then they work every day toward their distant vision, that goal or purpose. Brian Tracy
“One of the things that I do is that I question a lot of things… The worst thing you can end up with is a situation where you get told well this is the way it’s always been. That’s the worst ever. That’s a non-answer. Instead ask yourself: given everything we have today, is there a way we can make this better? Daniel Ek - Spotify
“Constantly seek out criticism. A well thought out critique of whatever you are doing is as valuable as gold. And you should seek that from everyone you can, but particularly your friends”. Elon Musk - Tesla, SpaceX
Because it's sometimes difficult for entrepreneurs to assess their mindset, and because it's vital for them to be supported by professionals capable of guiding them through their complex reality, we help them to identify and change the elements of their mindset in order to achieve their big goal. Business Coaching 3.0 by G&L Shit.
Follow me on LinkedIn and visit my website for more info! Read more from Sandrine!
Sandrine Gelin-Lamrani, Senior Level Executive Contributor Brainz Magazine A graduate of the Institut d'Etudes Politiques in Strasbourg and the MS SMIB at ESSEC, Sandrine has been a multi-expatriate and serial entrepreneur for 20 years. She built her 25 years international career in consulting, training, coaching ventures over 8 countries, for clients that include big corporations, Start Ups, and NGOs across a wide range of industries – IT, Pharmaceuticals, Cosmetics, Education, Security, Media.
Providing Professional Coaching 3.0 groundbreaking resources and tools, she helps her clients get gRowing by giving them a framework for reflection, placing them in a positive dynamic that generates opportunities, actions, and success. With over a dozen international certifications, accreditations and awards in the field of professional coaching, she supports entrepreneurial leaders, managers and expatriates who wish to consciously take the lead in their own development.
Published Author, Public Speaker and Radio Columnist, she shares her expertise in : interpersonal skills, entrepreneurial mindset, international career & intercultural management.
Her special power : helping you navigate your complex reality thanks to her global expertise, leadership experience, cutting edge strategies and growth mindset!
Her passion : Creating, Connecting, Contributing.
