Craft Your Personal Servant Purpose Statement

Craft Your Personal Servant Purpose Statement

S. Chris Edmonds is a sought-after speaker, author, and executive consultant. He’s the founder and CEO of The Purposeful Culture Group, which he launched in 1990. Chris helps senior leaders build and sustain purposeful, positive, productive work cultures. He is the author or co-author of seven books, including Amazon bestsellers Good Comes First (2021) with Mark Babbitt, The Culture Engine (2014), and Leading at a Higher Level (2008) with Ken Blanchard.

With the start of a new month, a new season, or a new quarter often comes the desire to be more productive, start a new hobby, lose weight, get organized, exercise more diligently, pay off debt, save more money, serve those around us, etc.

And – the best way to sustain beneficial change is to create a solid foundation on which to build that change.

Over time I have found that the best foundation is a personal servant purpose statement. Especially as a leader who may also be a public figure, taking the time to craft this statement can help you focus on what is important to you as a common thread throughout all aspects of your life.

I provide a step-by-step approach for creating your life servant purpose in my book, The Culture Engine. Even with my detailed instructions, creating an effective, concise personal “reason for being” that describes how we serve others is hard to do.

When discussing this topic, one leader shared that she was struggling to create one overarching servant purpose statement for the many roles she engages in daily – one for family, one for each of her two businesses, etc. “Each of my roles requires different behaviors and demands different outcomes. Don’t I need a different purpose statement for each role?”

A formal overarching personal servant purpose statement serves as firm footing for each step you take, daily, to ensure you serve others well.

CHRIS EDMONDS

Here’s how I answered her question.

Remember that you have one life and with that in mind craft a single personal servant purpose.

Creating one all-encompassing personal servant purpose makes it easier to know when you’re living in alignment with that purpose and when you’re off track. It also helps you make better decisions in every role and any role to come, ensuring you are living your best self in service to others daily.

Be aware that our society (and virtually every society around the globe) has trained us to look at what we DO daily – the results we deliver – rather than how we want to BE, consistently, with others in every interaction. A servant purpose is about how to BE our best serving self.

Address the “to what end” question. What is the service outcome you want to deliver? That’s where the synergy comes from – with clarity about how you, over time, improve others’ quality of life in every interaction.

A formal overarching personal servant purpose statement serves as firm footing for each step you take, daily, to ensure you serve others well in every role, at home, at work, in your community.