Developing a leadership style that empowers people and at the same time facilitates organizational development is not easy. Sometimes, the problem can come from a dissociation between owners and managers or because these two levels are not aligned. At other times, people are likely to be reluctant to participate by giving voice to their contributions to promote change or to define new forms of collaboration and coordination in teams. This may be due to disaffection caused by situations that have occurred in the past or by internal discrepancies of a very diverse nature. In these situations, getting all the people in an organization (property, managers, teams) aligned with the same purpose can be very difficult.

However, there is something that joins all the people who make up a collective reality such as any type of organization. Something capable of mobilizing all people and aligning them in the same direction. We speak of the common good, which we believe will benefit all people equally. For this, it will be necessary to define and visualize how the organization manages to create a positive social impact. In this sense, the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) promoted by the United Nations are an excellent guide to facilitate and accelerate alignment. The 17 SDGs focus on the development and prosperity of people, peace and justice, the development of alliances that help the most disadvantaged and the protection of the planet from environmental degradation and thus favor its recovery for generations to come.

If the organization seeks legitimate connection points between its own purpose and the maximum possible number of each of these SDGs, an expanded corporate or institutional purpose can be established that goes beyond corporate objectives. In this way, this expanded purpose allows all people to align themselves with a higher reason for being that transcends beyond the organizational context.

In order to successfully link the organizational purpose with these SDGs, it is necessary to show how coherent these objectives are with the inputs (resources needed to run the organization), the activities (what the organization does or makes), the outputs (products or services the organization makes, sells or offers), and the outcomes (immediate benefit to recipients of the products or services). And it will also be essential to see how they relate to all the agents that are present in the corporate ecosystem: employees, shareholders, suppliers, users, and customers.

Since our inception, at The FITA Institute we have committed to conscious leadership as well as agile to achieve evolved teams and organizations through our CALP © (Conscious & Agile Leadership Program) program. Both in this program and in those aimed at owners and boards of directors, we always incorporate the need to connect property and management with the search for a social impact that allows favoring the integration of the vision of that project and its connection with the world in which it takes place.

Aligning one’s own corporate objectives with the organization’s contribution to the development of a better and sustainable world allows us to add all the efforts and visions that exist, overcoming hierarchical and functional differences. Therefore, owners and leaders have a responsibility to put their organizations at the service of a positive social impact. The reward is a better world where you can continue to offer your products or services and a responsible and evolved organization.

© The FITA Institute (2023)

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