Make Meaning in Your Company

                Nobody here in this world does not want somehow to succeed, to be known and be expertise in the field that they love. All of us yearn to become what we had always dreamed about at broad daylight. Some wanted to become an artists, singer, educator, musician, inventor, scientists, astronaut, pilot, magician, and businessman or to beat Carlos Slim Helu and his family having a net worth of sixty nine billion dollars of the Telecom to be the richest man in the whole wide world! Who wouldn’t want to?

                What we have in our minds are very powerful. One day your just an ordinary person walking on the subway doing serendipity walks suddenly bumps to something and have thought of an extraordinary idea that you immediately put into action. The next day, you became the great competitor of larger companies in the world. Amazing isn’t it? We can never tell what really would happen tomorrow! One day you are just nobody to anybody, someday you became someone to everybody. Life is full of surprises everyone must be aware of.

It is often told that the key to success is what’s inside your thoughts. Sometimes it is by the way people think of life’s opportunities and possibilities that make an individual as successful as he can be. Sometimes it is in our own way of thinking about the things and what actions are we going to make to pursue those thoughts that we have. Remembering the movie “Pirates of the Silicon Valley”, Steve Jobs was just an ordinary person who did not finish his studies but became successful because of just a simple idea that he simply put into action. Another successful businessman of today’s generation is Guy Kawasaki who is the founder of Managing Director of Garage Technology Ventures. I will share to you my reflection concerning his “Art of Start” in making meaning to the company.

                On October 21, 2004, Guy Kawasaki spoke to Stanford University students about making meaning in your company. In the statement that he delivered, he believed that those companies who set out to make positive change in the world are only those who will ultimately be successful someday. He emphasizes that the core and the essence of entrepreneurship is about making meaning as well as making difference.

                Many people especially those who were starting to put up a business and be an entrepreneur thought of it just to make money and become rich. But never did they know that those who only thought of making money for the purpose of doing a business oftentimes are the ones who do not became successful in the near future. They only end up losing more instead of gaining something. As what Guy Kawasaki says, “My naïve and romantic belief is that if you make meaning, you probably make money. If you sell out to make money, you probably not make meaning and you won’t make money.”

His approach in making the company successful is that the goal must be to make meaning. Like doing something because you want to change the world, to make the world a better place and to make meaning or to make differences. You must not set your goal just to make money to be called successful but to make a change to the way people live or to make the world a better living place.

                On his speech, he said that the core of why you start a company must be to make meaning. There are three components of how to make meaning:

1. Increase the quality of life

In increasing the quality of life, each of the company members must be motivated in changing the world to make people more creative and more productive. They must think of a proper solution as to how they can transform the way people live and increase their way of living. Instilling those motivations would keep the company going despite many difficulties that they may come across. But doing so, they would not only help other people but they can also help themselves.  

2. Right a wrong

The very core to right a wrong is to end what is not right. It means that when you notice something is wrong; you must have to have an idea or ways on how to make it right. You must have a mind that has a capability to think that you can solve a problem and you want to solve it. For example, there is a crime or pollution taking all over the place, we can think of a possible solution to solve that particular problem like reporting it to the police or to report it to the administration about the improper segregation of waste that causes pollution or the smoke from vehicles and burning rubbers. Right a wrong means you must have the power to end something that you think is not right not only for you but also for every individual living in this world. Be a part of the solution finder not in the problem maker.

3. Prevent the end of something good

You can end what is not right but you cannot end something if it is good. For example, you saw something that is beautiful before but then it is being ruined and eroded today. You must think of a possible solution on how to bring it back to life.  You must preserve something that is important. Like the mother earth, sometimes people misuse its benefits and abuse it, as a good citizen you must take actions to that so you can preserve its beauty throughout.

If you are starting to put up a company someday, make sure your purpose is to make meaning and have those three mentioned above. You must not only build something for money and only for money itself but you must build something that everyone can benefit and that can change the way people live. It must be something with good reasons not that selfish one. As what Guy Kawasaki says,”If you make meaning, you probably make money. If you sell out to make money, you probably not make meaning and you won’t make money.”