The Capitalization of Community
Late last year (as if it was so long ago) I attended a keynote presentation featuring Larry Brilliant of Google.org and Malcolm Gladwell author of The Tipping Point. Larry Brilliant shared his inspirational story of leading the first organization of doctors to rid the world of smallpox and how it eventually lead him to his current role managing Google’s Global Philanthropic efforts. He termed the practice of weaving service into a corporate culture - hybrid philanthropy; meaning providing 1% of profit, 1% of employee resources, and 1% of product to non-profits and community projects. The goal is to make the philanthropic mission so intertwined with the corporate culture that it can no longer survive without it. Malcolm Gladwell brought it down to a more personal level, encouraging the audience to consider, Human Capitalization. The limitless possibilities as individuals when we put our entire heart and mind into our work or a single mission.
Malcolm related stories about Bill Gates programming at the age of 13 on a mainframe at the University of Washington campus, or a team of students tackling a tough math problem and how, through persistence and honest effort, great results are achieved. Leaving the session, I considered how many of our VerticalResponse non-profit customers I meet take the time to thank me in person for our free service offering and discounts for non-profits (VR’s version of 1:1:1). They are so passionate about their cause and their story, it can’t help but inspire my team in our efforts to provide better service and share in their success. Whether it’s our non-profit customers or business owners, it’s the passion behind our customer’s intellect that catapults their success.
A point I think both the great speakers failed to note is the contagious nature of attitude. Like the smallpox virus that can just as easily spread to destroy, the more we share and hear about other’s efforts to affect the greater good and fulfill our dreams, the more likely we are to push ourselves just a little bit harder - putting our heart and mind behind our own work. Then, collectively, we are one step closer to achieving the capitalization of an entire community!
January 8th, 2009 at 5:38 am
I agree, only a bit halfheartedly. I’ve seen a bad attitude infecting hard working employees as well, in this case if you don’t root out the problem you might lose a valuable asset. It’s, in my experience, terribly hard to spot these bad influences in advance. the only effective method of dealing with this kind of thread is keeping a close watch on your employees productivity, and more importantly, their happiness
Jmes
January 8th, 2009 at 1:57 pm
More than anything, this sense of community building and collaboration is what I believe will get companies through the current economic situation. We can diversify the work that we do and make an effort to sustain one another in a way that helps all of us weather the storm. Thanks for your thoughts.
January 8th, 2009 at 2:43 pm
Great comments. I have to say, I’ve never been more excited about a job in my career since joining VerticalResponse because I witness the passion of our CEO (sitting right next to her doesn’t hurt) and our customers on a daily basis. If the passion isn’t contagious within your organization, ask yourself if you’ve been displaying it, if your management team feels it and if everyone shares positive feedback from the customers on a regular basis.
January 9th, 2009 at 12:53 pm
I agree with you whole heartedly. When people can really feel that they contribute and make a tangible difference in the community/world, their passion and commitment to the organization is exponential. It can be a great tool in employee retention and non financial employee benefits that increase job satisfaction. In economically challenging times, most companies will be asking fewer people to do a lot more of the work. Many will rise to this challenge with “community cultural pride’ when they are truly behind the organization. Attitude can be infectious and authentic modeling from executives is key!
January 9th, 2009 at 7:32 pm
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