Are your Values shaping your Career?
May 19th 2016
This time two years ago the culmination of several events in my career and life prompted me to take a step back and start considering and re-evaluating what most mattered to me in my work. In the sales world there are constantly incentives, spiffs, and promotion opportunities which were keeping me very focused, but I decided to take some time to forget about money and career-trajectory and ask myself what would really make me happy. What were my core values, and was I aligned with them in my work?
LinkedIn's talent acquisition team are very good at ensuring that all hires are a good cultural fit, and indeed I loved and still love LinkedIn's values. But each of us as individuals has our own very personal set of values, which also evolve over time, and when I started reflecting on mine I discovered that several pieces of the puzzle were still missing in my work/value alignment. When I joined LinkedIn, I had returned to Ireland after eight years abroad, and my plan was to spend a few years in LinkedIn Dublin before hopefully transferring to somewhere more exotic. However, as the months and years passed by I found myself more and more drawn to the uniqueness of our beautiful little Emerald Isle, and more interested in its well-being, and the huge potential we have as a nation, so often underestimated, exported or over-looked.
It is now more common when speaking about the 'well-being' of the nation that it is the economic well-being being referred to rather than the actual level of wellness, health and happiness of the people and our communities. But what's the point in being very healthy economically if a nation's health is suffering in other regards? I am reminded of the quote by A.F. Reb Materi on the wall of my favourite eatery, the Happy Pear, - 'So many people spend their health gaining wealth, and then have to spend their wealth to regain their health'.
I believe that the Irish nation has incredible potential to be a leader in many areas, and I believe that the first step in building the foundations of leadership, and success, however we may define this latter term, is to improve our individual and collective well-being. In order to thrive we need to first be fully well as individuals and as communities - physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually. This led me to caring more about our social problems and less about our economic state-of-affairs, which in turn led me to the discovery of the term 'social entrepreneurship'.
I decided that I wanted to become a social entrepreneur, and that I wanted to use yoga and music to heal the nation. Yes, I'm idealistic, and long may it last! This is still a long-term dream, and will come to fruition when the time is right. Through my research on social entrepreneurship, I came across a fascinating organisation called 'Social Entrepreneurs Ireland' (SEI), and as fate would have it they posted the perfect role for me the final week of my notice period with LinkedIn. The stars began to align.
Now eight months into my role with SEI, I've had the intention for several months of writing a post about social entrepreneurship, but there is just so much to say on the topic that I honestly haven't known where to begin. I will give a brief overview here of my experience with social entrepreneurship thus far to give you a taster for this world, and will go into further depth at a later date.
My personal definition of a social entrepreneur is an entrepreneur whose driving force is positive social change rather than commercial return. Therefore, the priority of a social entrepreneur is not to make a profit or a return, but to make a positive social impact. There is of course a whole spectrum of social entrepreneurship. There are entrepreneurs who do aim to make a profit, and who also make a positive impact on the world, and then there are entrepreneurs who, as a result of the complexity of the social problem they are addressing, are set up as 'not-for-profit' organisations. In Social Entrepreneurs Ireland we, for the most part, support the latter. We believe that Ireland is not solving its social problems quickly enough, and that supporting Ireland's leading social entrepreneurs is the most effective and efficient way of solving these social problems. This matters to me personally, because I want to invest my time and energy on this earth in creating the type of Ireland that I believe we all deserve to live in. That is - an Ireland where everybody, regardless of background, ability, gender, or circumstances, is given the opportunity to realise their dreams and live fulfilling and happy lives.
I feel incredibly fortunate to have the opportunity to work for an organisation, with the motto 'Think Big, Act Now, Change Ireland', with a team of people who work tirelessly to support social entrepreneurs to create a better Ireland for all of us. Over the last 11 years we have supported 190 early-stages social entrepreneurs, providing them with funding and bringing them on a 1-2 year support programme during which we help them build solid foundations and scaling plans to replicate their solutions across Ireland and beyond. Several of the organisations we've supported, such as FoodCloud, CoderDojo and Pieta House have now expanded beyond our shores, and are proof of just how much new and innovative approaches to time-old issues in the areas of food poverty, education and mental health respectively, can so quickly have an impact on the social problem in question. Taking FoodCloud as an example -over the last 4 years FoodCloud have donated over 1.8 million meals, and saved 855 tonnes of food that would otherwise have gone to waste!
There are too many incredibly inspiring stories to write them all here, but if you are interested in the types of projects we have supported, I would highly encourage you have a look at our website. Our vision is for an Ireland where the people are empowered to act and tackle the social problems they would like to solve, so that we don't lose time, lives, years of wasted potential waiting for problems to be solved for us. There has been a notable shift over the last few years in this country as people have started taking a more proactive approach rather than waiting for problems to be solved for them. This is a very positive step in the right direction.
Anyway, the purpose of this post was not to go into too much detail on social entrepreneurship and the inspiring social entrepreneurs that we have supported, but to draw your attention to the fact that we are hiring, and that if you, like me, care passionately about the importance of social entrepreneurship based on your own core values - please do have a look at our roles and see if you might be the ideal candidate! I would go so far as to say that if you have read this much of my musings on social entrepreneurship and its merits, there must at least be some hint of interest in what we stand for, and that you should at least take the opportunity to follow our company page on LinkedIn to keep updated on our work!
Personally, what I have enjoyed most about my last eight months with SEI, is the following:
Our Team - as a small and very collaborative team, we care a lot about our work and the social entrepreneurs. We are a thoughtful, curious and driven group of individuals, but we also make sure to have a lot of fun along the way. Fun of course being a key ingredient to success!
Our Awardees & Alumni - I have been star-struck on many an occasion during our awardee and alumni events when meeting people who in my eyes are the true heroes and heroines of Irish society - the likes of Michael Kelly from GIY, Joan Freeman from Pieta House, Mairead Healy from Future Voices and many more. I'm lucky enough to have a job that involves telling their stories and ensuring that we get funding to invest in more such modern-day heros and heroines of Ireland.
Our Funders and Supporters - our funders and corporate partners quite simply make me feel proud to be Irish. I had no idea before entering this world of philanthropy and giving, that there was so much good-will out there among the Irish or friends of the Irish at home and abroad. In order to fund the work we do, we are constantly looking to grow our support base, and this has given me the opportunity to meet with some very interesting, accomplished and generous people. On a side note- if you are such a person or company, we are now raising funds for our 2016 Awards, so please do get in touch!
In summary, my advice is the following - take time every so often to check in with your values. You may know what your values were two years ago, but have they evolved? Ensuring the work you are doing and the career you are designing for yourself is aligned with what you most truly believe is a valuable use of your time and energy on this earth, is time well spent. If your values are aligned with ours in SEI and you are our ideal candidate, do please get in touch! If you are not our ideal candidate at this point in time but are interested in social entrepreneurship, do link in with us in some shape or form and tell your socially-minded friends to do so too.
I will leave you with a video from our 2015 awardees on the moment they decided to act. If you are a talented Communications/Marketing professional, and decide that this is your moment to act, your decision could have a big impact on how we in Social Entrepreneurs Ireland shape the future of Ireland over the coming years. Will you join us in telling the stories and supporting the journeys of the social entrepreneurs in this video and many more?
Image - Maksim Shutov @maksimshutov