Before you were conceived in your mother’s womb, Leadership and Purpose IQ™ was the deciding factor for your future. Your first experience with the hand of leadership began with the circumstances that surrounded your conception. From there, you were placed under medical care for nine months until the time of delivery. When the big day came, the leadership of the doctors and nurses went into full affect to lead you through a series of medical procedures to exit your mother’s womb. At that point, leadership was transferred back to your parents who not only was responsible for nurturing your physical body, but helping you make sense out of the circumstances that surrounded you. As strange as it may sound, you are where you are today because of the Leadership and Purpose IQ™ of the people that were assigned to your life!
From Conception to Perception
In many cases, leadership is an obvious contributor to your success, but maybe you’ve never considered the Purpose IQ™. It could be that you’ve never heard of a Purpose IQ™, but keep in mind that your lack of awareness does not limit its influence in your life.
Let’s revisit the circumstances that surrounded your conception. Maybe your parents did not have kids until they were married, and one day decided to have a child. Your birth was the consent of two responsible people who used sex as an expression of their love, with the hopes of conceiving a child.
On the other hand, maybe your birth was the product of two unmarried people who got lost in a passionate moment that led to sexual intercourse. After a few weeks, they discovered that their hot steamy night led to a package in the womb. Unlike the first scenario, news about your conception was a surprise that created different circumstances that surrounded your birth.
A quick lesson on life teaches us that there are different circumstances that surround conception, but success in life is a matter of perception that we receive from those around us. If our parents had a bad perception regarding the circumstances that surrounded our birth, it could have adversely affected the way we perceived our future. On the other hand, if our parents had a strong sense of purpose regardless of the circumstances, the future would have been positively affected.
Parenting was our first exposure to the dynamics between leadership and purpose. It’s where leadership and purpose collide to build a bridge to our future. From this we can craft one of the most important thoughts for achievement.
It declares; the degree of success in our future is dependent on the degree of purpose in our present.
There’s no better example of this thought than the parent and child relationship, and we must use it to build better dynamics between Leadership and Purpose IQ™.
Leading like a parent
On December 29, 2014, Inc. magazine published an article about the findings of leadership development consultants Jack Zenger and Joseph Folkman. They asked 330,000 bosses about the most important skills that leaders need. After their research, they compiled a list of the top 10 leadership skills, and inspiration and motivation was number one.
Peter Economy, the writer of the article stated,
Great leaders create a vision of the future that is vivid and compelling, and that motivates employees to want to achieve it.
He continued by saying,
…As a leader, you are best able to help the members of your team connect what they do to the impact it has on customers and communities.
The findings of Mr. Zenger and Folkman should inspire you to embrace the fact that the success in your future is directly connected to the degree of purpose in your present. The mark of great leadership is being able to cast a vision for the future with parent-like guidance. You must be able to use purpose to inspire and motivate those around you to impact the world. Sure leadership is more than inspiration and motivation, but both combined with a sense of purpose will increase the impact you have on those you lead.
The Impact Factor
An unwritten law of human development and growth is that the closer the people around you are to your origin and potential, the higher the impact they will have in your life. If you had to make an impact chart and list everyone who impacted your life, you probably would start with your parents. Secondly would be a close family member, and third would be a toss up between a minister, teacher, or coach.
Keep in mind that your origin is closely connected to where you came from and your potential is connected to where you are going. Each role mentioned above has something to do with either where you came from, or where you are going. This is why you are susceptible to being impacted by people who function in these roles.
The challenge for leaders in the twenty-first century is not so much as mastering the top 10 leadership skills, as it is creating an impact action plan to affect change within followers.
Leaders must master the delicate balance between origin and potential. In other words, they must be able to lead from a place that brings value to how people feel, and use that value to direct where they are going. This requires a high Purpose IQ™ and is the guiding force between a leader and his or her followers. If leaders understand how to harness this powerful force, they will help others create new patterns of purpose to affect change.
Your Purpose IQ™
History has proven that the person, who makes the greatest impact, is the man or woman who has been impacted the most. You have heard the saying that change begets change! Well purpose is the starting point for change, because it will affect the way you think, speak, and behave, and dramatically impact your life in new ways. Your Purpose IQ™ is defined as your insight to know how purpose affect the way you think, speak, and behave in order to give you a strong sense of purpose to win the game of life.
If you fail to master the insight on how purpose affects change in your thoughts, speech, and actions, you will restrict your sense of purpose to affect change in those you lead. Your Purpose IQ™ is closely related to where you came from, and where you are going. It’s the key to helping you make sense out of your past in order to crystallize your vision for the future. When you have a high Purpose IQ™, not only will you play the game of life as a champion, you will be able to help others elevate their game to play like a champion.
In the words of Nikos Mourkogiannis, Co-Founder of Harvard Center for Negotiations and business expert,
Purpose is the game of champions, only strong minded men and women – adults with powerful intellects and real character and spines of steel – are suited for it.
One of the biggest mistakes you can make as a leader is to confine purpose to a person’s passion. Purpose is an intuitive force first and a passionate force second. Yes, it is closely related to your passion, but your Purpose IQ™ is bigger than what you do with your gifts and talents. If fact, your purpose consist of four sub-categories, which include your gifts and talents. However, they only constitute seventeen percent of your purpose.
It’s amazing that many leaders spend a great deal of time planting seeds of purpose to help individuals connect their gifts and talents to their passion, but it’s the other three categories that allow followers to harvest the energy of purpose for achievement.
Leadership guru ‘John Maxwell’ states,
The best leaders are readers of people. They have the intuitive ability to understand others by discerning how they feel and recognizing what they sense.
Mr. Maxwell’s statement describes the dynamics between Leadership and Purpose IQ™, but you must remember that reading people is more than emotional intelligence. It is the product of a high Purpose IQ™, which skillfully uses the remaining sub-categories of purpose to sharpen your intuition. Remember that the closer people are to your origin and potential, the greater their impact. The remaining sub-categories of purpose are directly connected to where you came from, and what it takes to get you where you want to go. They are the hallmark of great leadership and the path of least resistance for inspiration and motivation.
The remaining sub-categories of purpose consist of:
The Big Three purpose questions
Philosophy of purpose
Character
Earlier I mentioned that success in life is a matter of perception from those around us. Now you can see that a great leader not only discerns how we feel, and recognize what we are sensing, they are skilled in using the remaining sub-categories of purpose, as aids to inspire and motivate us beyond our surroundings. As a result, they not only cast a vision for our future, they help us build a bridge so the vision can become a reality.
Elevating your Purpose IQ™ is more than another leadership exercise. It is your impact action plan to affect change in the lives of those you lead. You can be a good leader with an average Purpose IQ™, but if you want to be a great leader, stop making excuses and raise your Purpose IQ™ so you can help others build that bridge!
The driving force behind the Purpose Development Institute is to produce programs to help our clients raise their Purpose IQ™. Our business model is built on the premise that you cannot change what you cannot measure. As a result, we use a series of Purpose IQ™ assessments to help our clients measure their ability to turn purpose into a resource.
Again, the worst thing you can do is to confine your leadership skills to simply planting seeds of purpose within those you lead. Discover how to master skills to help them harvest the energy of purpose. Contact us today and have your Purpose IQ™ checked, and discuss your coaching options!