Passion - If you can't do what you love, love what you do!

by Don Harkey

"Do what you love!"

There are many career councilors who tell people to simply do what they love. If you love playing the guitar, find a way to make a living playing the guitar. If you love actuarial tables, go work for an insurance company. If you love playing basketball, find a way to make a living playing basketball.

What a nice goal! If you really want to be an actor, move to LA and scratch and claw your way into every play, movie, TV show, or commercial you can while waiting tables to make ends meet. Work hard to develop and broaden your skills. Don't stop dreaming and give it your best shot.

Now what if you fail? The cruel fact is that a lot of people would like to make a living as an actor, musician, or professional athlete and very few people actually make a living at it. In our society, we tend to be "all or nothing" about our careers. Follow your dreams! Reach for the stars! Then reality hits and people hit the ground hard.

If only I had received that football scholarship, I wouldn't be working here in this factory. If only I had been a little taller, I wouldn't need to sell houses for a living. If only I didn't have these family commitments, I could go back to school and do something I really love. Life doesn't really work that way.

What if people focused on loving what they do rather than doing what they love? What's the difference?

In the popular book by Jim Collins, "Good to Great", Mr. Collin's studied companies who made a transition from "good" to "great" and sustained "greatness". These companies had several traits in common that fly in the face of some conventional wisdom. One trait is known as the Hedgehog Concept. "Great" companies know the answers to 3 simple questions. What are we passionate about? What are we best at? What is our economic engine? I want to focus on the first question.

What difference does it make if a company is "passionate" about what they do? Most of us know the answer to this. If people are excited about something, they simply do a better job doing it. If I am passionate about playing the guitar, I am likely to spend a lot of time practicing my skills and learning new techniques without requiring any direct rewards (or threats). People who are passionate about something are inherently (internally) motivated to excel.

Now let's look at some of the companies on the "Good to Great" list (and remember that some of these companies have made another transition from "Great" to "Good" or even to "Bad").

Circuit City. While Circuit City certainly has not done well over the past few years, they outperformed the market by more than 18 times from 1982 to 1997. Were they passionate about what they did? It certainly seems reasonable that Circuit City could find employees who are passionate about electronics and the latest gadgets. The individual stores probably did not need to provide huge incentives for employees to keep up to date on the latest technology. All they had to do was hire people who love electronics. This fits the "do what you love" concept... but let's look at some of the others on the list.

Gillette. Gillette makes personal care products. Do you know anyone who says, "I have a passion for making personal care products! I wonder if Gillette will hire me?" That's not very likely. However, Collins' research shows that Gillette people have a real passion for these products. For example, Gillette avoided a low-margin battle with its competitors over disposable razors. Why? They couldn't get excited about low-tech razors. Gillette had hired engineers and designers to create "shaving systems" (which are highlighted frequently in their commercials). These engineers became passionate about their work. In the book, one journalist is quoted as saying that one of Gillette's engineer "talks about shaving systems with the sort of technical gusto one expects from a Boeing or Hughes engineer".

Do you think that the same engineer talked about shaving systems while studying engineering in college? Probably not. This means that the engineer probably went to work for Gillette without knowing that they were about to do something they really loved. How could this person do what they love when they didn't even know it yet? Was the person just really lucky?

Instead, maybe the engineer had a passion for creating things. This probably lead them to engineering school in the first place. Maybe Gillette picked up on this passion when they hired this engineer. Maybe the engineer developed a quick appreciation for the complexity of shaving systems that "lift and cut" with adjustable blades while applying aftershave. The engineer probably developed a basic skill and then learned to love what they do.

How does this apply to the average person? I believe it is possible for any person to find something they love about any job, if the work environment is right and the employee has the right attitude.

I often work with manufacturing employees. These employees spend their days making "widgets" (aka: insert product name here) on a factory floor. They are told how to make the widgets, get paid by the hour, and generally never dreamed about making widgets when they were growing up. However, I have seen a wide range of attitudes from one facility to another.

In one facility, the workers are beaten down. They slowly get the job done and put little extra effort into what they do. They look at their job as a necessary evil required to collect enough money to make their downtime more fun. They resist change and are suspicious of management (usually for a good reason).

In another facility, the workers are lively. They carry pride in their work and they are willing to put down a lot of extra effort to make a good "widget". They give constant feedback to management (who usually embraces it) and are constantly changing in an effort to find a better way. These workers enjoy their time off and certainly like their paychecks, but they find satisfaction in their work beyond the money.

Which facility do you think performs better? Which facility makes a better "widget" at a lower cost? The difference isn't that the first facility couldn't find people passionate about widget making. The difference is that the second facility was able to create an environment where their people could feel passion about what they do. They were given some level of choice (autonomy), training (competence), and were given the "big picture" of how they impact the company (relatedness). These workers learned to love how to make widgets.

Of course, this is a two-way street. While an organization is certainly responsible for creating an environment conducive to allowing their employees to feel a "pride of workmanship" (a phrase borrowed from W. Edwards Deming), an employee must allow themselves to carry the attitude that if they put good effort into the job, they just might enjoy it. Have you ever met someone who appears to enjoy their work even when the job seems less than motivating? They have found the secret.

Learn to love what you do and you will always be able to do what you love!