If you’ve been following my work for a while, you’ll know that I geek out when I get to talk about the why. The why? The reason why you do what you do.
It’s fascinating to me to realise that so many entrepreneurs, business owners and brand managers have never taken the time to delve into their why. In fact, it’s pretty normal for my clients to have a radical shift when they connect to their why for the very first time.
All this talk of the ‘why’ started when a super smart cookie by the name of Simon Sinek did a TED talk way back in 2009. If you haven’t seen it, then stop reading this article right now and take 18 minutes out of your day to watch it (oh, and then come back haha).
Sinek says ‘People don’t buy what you do, they buy why you do it’
Say that out loud a couple of times… let it sink in.
Interesting huh? But the issue most brands have is they genuinely have no freaking idea what their why is. Most have a slightly generic default answer to the question ‘why do you do what you do ?’, but haven’t actually explored this whole why concept in any depth.
Here’s the thing: Figuring out your why isn’t easy. It’s not just a case of reverse engineering and coming up with something that would look good on a bumper sticker.
But holy smokes, once you’ve nailed it? Once you’ve connected to your why? Powerful stuff happens. I could talk all day about the benefits of knowing your why and infusing it into your business. But I want to touch on just one area today, aligning your business to your why, and using it as a compass moving forwards.
I’ll give you an example. And it feels pretty valid for me, as it’s something that has been unfolding very recently in my business.
For those of you who don’t know, on top of working as a brand strategist, I also run a business called SUPKids. It’s a rad startup that teaches environmental education, water safety and stand up paddling to kids. It started off as a fun little project in Aus, turned into a collaboration with the Royal Flying Doctor Service and is now rolling out globally.
And in the last 6 months, things have gone a little crazy for SUPKids. In a good way. Partnerships, collaboration opportunities, funding, training trips, ambassadors… all amazing stuff. And we haven’t officially launched yet.
But just recently I’ve found myself a little overwhelmed with all the noise. All sorts of awesome people & organisations reaching out wanting to get involved.
And it was only yesterday that I felt a weird sense that I’d been here before. That I’d experienced something similar when I was running music festivals. This feeling of gaining momentum fast, of trying to keep up with the increased attention and exposure.
Remembering what it felt like to have everyone want a piece of you.
Then it hit me. This is where I messed up before. It was at this point, in my last business, where I slipped on a pair of rose-tinted glasses and saw only the Disney version of what was going on. Wow, everyone wants to be a part of this!
And here’s what I did back then….. I put all those interested folk way way up on a pedestal. I thought ‘I should be flattered by all the attention’ (let’s be honest, my ego was loving it). I stopped looking at opportunities with a critical (read: sensible) lens. I said yes to a whole bunch of stuff without taking the time to establish whether it was actually a good fit.
Long story short? It didn’t work out (haha this is probably the biggest understatement I’ve ever used).
Anyhows, let me bring this back to the why. Looking back I can see now that, as festival directors, we never knew what our why was. And so, when all this attention came flooding our way, we didn’t have a simple way to filter stuff into ‘yes-this-is-good-for-us’ or ‘thanks-but-no-thanks’.
And that’s where the why comes in. Knowing your why acts like a filter. A simple, but massively powerful method of ensuring that the decisions you make are aligned with what’s best for your business (not your ego).
The why of SUPKids?
We believe that when kids fall in love with an outdoor sport, they fall in love with the outdoors. And kids who love their planet become ambassadors for taking care of it.
And so yesterday when I was slipping into overwhelm and was being bombarded with awesome ideas & requests for collaborations, all I needed to do was re-align with the why.
Once I’d checked in with it, and remembered that this statement, this core belief, was at the core of everything we do for SUPKids, then it became blindingly obvious what I needed to lean into and what I needed to politely decline.
So I’m curious…. do you know your why ? Have you invested any time figuring it out ? Leaning into it ?