The View Back and Forward

For several days we have been working diligently planning the next year of our life. This type of planning used to be a solitary undertaking in which I would lock myself away to try to figure out the meaning of life and how I am supposed to manage my part in it for the next trip around the sun but this time I have my partner working it with me.

This is a mixed blessing.

We are two very different people, The Muse and I. She fastidious, patient, detail-oriented versus my impulsive, controlling,I'm-the-center-of-the-universe-so-c'mon-let's-get-on-with-it style. Which is probably more information that you wanted, but I am committed to candor in this blog.

Which brings up an interesting point.

In a recent blog post Jennifer Rice at mantrabrand.com questions the very idea of purpose and passion in business and branding. In a beautifully written article she examines some great companies with great "brands" that are really just passionate visions of what someone knows the world is supposed to be. The article instigated several comments challenging the concept of passion in business. Perhaps the word has been so over-used it seems hackneyed. Passion is not a term I think of often, let alone use. But candor - now that really rings with me.

Candor is the fire in the belly, the vision for the future, married with undaunting commitment to what is true and right.

Rice states:

"I believe that over-commercialization is leading to the demise of our society, and yet I’m in a profession of helping companies sell stuff that people don’t really need."

Yep, I get where she's coming from. Frankly, as we have reviewed many of the relationships we've worked with over the last year we were struck by the number of people whose leitmotif was "I'm not sure I really want this job." They were questioning the basic underpinnings of why they were doing what they did. We never talked about passion, but we have had many, many conversations in which there was unbridled candor. It seems to make the difference.

What do YOU think?