Start with why

Not the Only Way, Just One Way
Knowing your WHY is not the only way to be successful, but it is the only
way to maintain a lasting success and have a greater blend of innovation and
flexibility. When a WHY goes fuzzy, it becomes much more difficult to
maintain the growth, loyalty and inspiration that helped drive the original
success. By difficult, I mean that manipulation rather than inspiration fast
becomes the strategy of choice to motivate behavior. This is effective in the
short term but comes at a high cost in the long term.
Consider the classic business school case of the railroads. In the late 1800s,
the railroads were the biggest companies in the country. Having achieved such
monumental success, even changing the landscape of America, remembering
WHY stopped being important to them. Instead they became obsessed with
WHAT they did—they were in the railroad business. This narrowing of
perspective influenced their decision-making—they invested all their money in
tracks and crossties and engines. But at the beginning of the twentieth century, a
new technology was introduced: the airplane. And all those big railroad
companies eventually went out of business. What if they had defined themselves
as being in the mass transportation business? Perhaps their behavior would have
been different. Perhaps they would have seen opportunities that they otherwise
missed. Perhaps they would own all the airlines today.
The comparison raises the question of the long-term survivability of so many
other companies that have defined themselves and their industries by WHAT
they do. They have been doing it the same way for so long that their ability to
compete against a new technology or see a new perspective becomes a daunting
task. The story of the railroads has eerie similarities to the case of the music
industry discussed earlier. This is another industry that has not done a good job
of adjusting its business model to fit a behavioral change prompted by a new
technology. But other industries whose business models evolved in a different
time show similar cracks—the newspaper, publishing and television industries,
to name but three. These are the current-day railroads that are struggling to
define their value while watching their customers turn to companies from other
industries to serve their needs. Perhaps if music companies had a clearer sense of
WHY, they would have seen the opportunity to invent the equivalent of iTunes
instead of leaving it to a scrappy computer company.
In all cases, going back to the original purpose, cause or belief will help these

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industries adapt. Instead of asking, “WHAT should we do to compete?” the
questions must be asked, “WHY did we start doing WHAT we’re doing in the
first place, and WHAT can we do to bring our cause to life considering all the
technologies and market opportunities available today?” But don’t take my word
for it. None of this is my opinion. It is all firmly grounded in the tenets of
biology.

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