employee experiences – but none is so prevalent as lack of passion. I am forever struck by the number of people who spend over one‐third of their lives engaged in activities (work) from which they derive so little joy. As Henry David Thoreau said, “The mass of men live lives of quiet desperation.”
If you consider that work and sleep combine to consume about two‐thirds of our life – and that the preparation and recovering from each will expend another sizable chunk – we have precious little time left over to engage in activity for which we are passionate. It is hard to imagine that doing the laundry, grocery shopping, getting your oil changed, mowing the lawn, and all the other activities most of us spend our “free” time doing will provide an avenue for our passion. Therefore, our vocation offers us the best opportunity for joy over an enduring period. On the other hand, if we are passionate about our work, amazing performance is within our grasp.
If passion fuels individual performance and organizations are simply collectives of individuals, then clearly passion is the foundation for any successful organization. It begins with the founder/proprietor/owner/executive/leader, and employees responsible for the organization's performance. I suppose it is possible for an institution to eclipse the passion of its leader, but that shouldn't be necessary. Leaders must drive passion, not limit it. However, sometimes they do the latter. It has been my experience that successful organizations are founded by two types of people. What they have in common is a strong work ethic. They will do what is necessary to will their company to success. However, only one of these types of people will have enduring success—and that is the one who combines this abundant work ethic with a passion for the work being done.
Through the years, I have met many entrepreneurs with amazing ideas that I could not have begun to imagine. I have met brilliant businesspeople with an aptitude for capitalism that I will never possess. I have seen organizations fortunate enough to have immense capital at their disposal or to be located geographically or situationally in such a way that their competition was at an enormous disadvantage. While talent, imagination, money, location, and context are all vital to an organization's success, nothing is more important than passion. Why? Because the dirty secret of success is this: as hard as it is to achieve it, it is infinitely harder to continue it. Work ethic—what I think of as desire—is critical to achieving success; but passion is critical for continuing it.
DESIRE VERSUS PASSION
Desire is plentiful in the moment a business begins. The birth of a business is often the result of desire overcoming fear. Starting a business is scary. Risk is high. Rewards are not guaranteed. For a company to exist at all, there was a moment when the desire to create it outweighed the daunting barriers that could – likely would – undermine success. Sure, some businesses begin with ample money and clear advantages. But I'm not talking about those exceptions. I'm talking about the organizations that began with the desire of a single or small group of risk‐takers with a vision or, at least, a dream.
These organizations often fail. They fail because running a successful company is hard. Often, the mindset that leads to excellence is also the type of mind that thinks critically; and when you think critically, you continually see problems to solve. While that is an exceptional perspective for continuous improvement, it ensures that you won't relax much, sleep well, or truly ever be completely satisfied. It takes a special quality to propel an individual through the ongoing challenges, setbacks, and uncertainty involved in succeeding. Many start strong, and even achieve success, only to slowly lose their edge (their passion) and watch the organization slide back to mediocrity or worse. Desire most often succumbs to weariness.
There are currently around 150 wineries in the Walla Walla Valley wine region where I live. The Walla Walla Community College's vinicultural and enology program is full of students with dreams of being the next successful winemaker, owner, and/or vineyard manager. Armed with a desire to do the hard work that it takes to succeed in this highly competitive space and the knowledge of how to make wine, they will arrive within a market saturated with competition. To succeed, they work long, arduous days to make, promote, and sell wine. And most will fail.
Desire can get you started. It can even make you successful. But desire is not an infinite vessel of motivation. Desire drains. Desire without joy is not passion.
Family‐owned businesses provide an excellent illustration of the difference between desire and passion. There is a belief related to family‐owned businesses that the third generation will kill the company. “Shirtsleeves to shirtsleeves in three generations” the saying goes. Working in numerous industries that are populated by family owned businesses, I have seen it firsthand. Generally, the business is founded by a passionate person who works hard, struggles, fights off the adversity, and succeeds using the foundation of passion. They channel their joy into action that endures. The second generation – a daughter or son who has witnessed this epic undertaking – brings fresh ideas, technologies, and, especially, passion to the battle. Often, the company becomes bigger, even more successful, and high performing during this time when both joy and endurance exist to create passion. The second generation saw the original passion and the demands created by the struggle for success. They “caught the bug,” as one father explained about his daughter's success with the family business.
Finally, a third generation enters leadership. This individual did not experience or observe the original struggle. They are not aware of how big a role joy played in creating success. While they may have the desire and work ethic necessary to succeed, they don't possess the passion that began and perpetuated the company. They ascend to leadership due to birthright, not because of joy in action. It is not an indictment of the grandchildren's talent or ability, but rather evidence of how necessary passion is when building and sustaining a success.
THE IMPORTANCE OF JOY
I know all about desire. I have displayed it consistently throughout my career. It was desire, roughly synonymous with “possessing a high work ethic,” that drove my achievements in the corporate world. It was desire that pushed me to be a television producer for CBS at 22 years old. It was desire that provided the fuel for my journey to the top human resources executive for an international hospitality management company at age 33. But it was also desire that revealed this key revelation to me: desire is not enough to create enduring performance. In fact, desire without passion often results in burnout. It did with me.
I burned out three times. Until I learned the danger of desire without the balance of joy, I continued to succumb to stress. Desire is about effort. Passion is about joy. Effort is finite; joy is self‐renewing. My corporate career from 1983 to 1995 was like a twelve‐year course on the importance of passion.
By 1995, I had distilled the source of my joy to some very specific activities. I knew I loved educating. Specifically, I loved making people laugh while they learned about themselves, others, and their organization. The things that diverted my attention away from that focus were the things that robbed me of joy, diluted my passion, and resulted in me losing my desire. I feel fortunate to have arrived at this revelation at a relatively young age. As a result, I was able to nudge my career in a direction that better aligned with my passion.
Now, before you start to assume that passion for your vocation makes everything easy – it doesn't. Passion is the foundation for peak performance culture, but it is not the entirety of operational excellence. What passion provides is the building block from which all else can be constructed. It is the perpetual fuel source to deal with all the challenges that will ensue. As an example, after I speak at a large conference, I am often approached by an audience member who says, “I want to do what you do.” I take it as it is intended, as a compliment. They see my passion and want to experience what it would be like to feel that way about a job. However, there is a lot more than passion necessary to success. One must have talent, a vision, a strategy, processes, commitment, resiliency, and so on. People see me on the stage. They don't see me in the airport at 4:00 a.m. or writing a proposal
