Are you ready to discover how purpose-driven practices can propel your business toward sustainable growth? In this episode of Predictable B2B Success, host Vinay Koshy sits down with the remarkable Colt Briner, founder of Scrappy AF Solutions and a master at transforming companies into purpose-driven organizations.

Prepare to be inspired as Colt shares his wealth of knowledge and experience from growing a company from $60 million to $2 billion through the power of purpose. Dive deep into the Purpose 5 framework, a roadmap Colt has developed to guide companies towards a purpose-driven approach.

Learn how purpose-driven organizations attract top talent, align their messaging, and create impact and innovation that surpasses their competitors. Discover the secrets behind operationalizing purpose, engaging internal stakeholders, and creating a consistent message that resonates with customers. If you’re ready to revolutionize your business and drive sustainable growth through purpose-driven practices, this episode is a must-listen!

About Colt Briner

Meet Colt Briner, an expert on transforming businesses into purpose-driven powerhouses. Having served as the Chief Communications Officer for Ensemble Health Partners, Colt played a vital role in the company’s phenomenal growth from a $60 million valuation to $2 billion in just two years by leveraging the power of purpose in business. 

Drawing from his 20+ years of experience in marketing and business development, Colt now shares his game-changing Purpose Five framework with business leadership teams to help them turn their organizations into purpose-driven entities. He’s passionate about ushering in a new era of business innovation centered around purpose, and his expertise has made him an invaluable resource for companies looking to evolve and thrive in today’s dynamic landscape.

Unlocking Success Through Purpose-Driven Practices: Insights from Colt Briner

In the fast-moving world of B2B, finding success can often feel like a daunting task. However, there is a powerful key that can unlock the door to predictable success – purpose. 

In this episode of the “Predictable B2B Success” podcast, host Vinay Koshy interviews Colt Briner, an expert in transforming companies into purpose-driven organizations. Briner shares his insights and experiences on how purpose can revolutionize businesses and drive long-term success. Let’s dive into the main takeaways from this enlightening conversation.

Understanding the Power of Purpose:

One of the fundamental aspects of establishing purpose in a company is aligning shared values and effectively communicating a clear statement of target, action, and results. Briner emphasizes that operationalizing purpose is crucial, and executive ownership and accountability for change in each functional area of the business are vital for its success. Workshops can be invaluable in helping executives understand their roles and the company’s purpose, enabling them to commit to specific actions and reporting measures.

Overcoming Challenges:

Time constraints can often impede companies’ efforts to operationalize purpose. However, Briner provides valuable suggestions to overcome this roadblock. Capturing client impact stories, integrating purpose into job descriptions and employee reviews, connecting department KPIs to the company’s purpose, and developing thought leadership content and solutions around purpose are just some of the strategies he recommends. Furthermore, recognizing and rewarding clients who contribute to the company’s purpose can amplify its impact in the market.

Getting Internal Stakeholders on Board:

Briner highlights the importance of fostering a purpose-driven mindset among internal stakeholders. While some individuals are intrinsically motivated by visionary purpose, others are more focused on practical outcomes such as financial success. By understanding and working with the diverse personality predispositions within an organization, companies can strike a balance between innovators, early adopters, institutionalists, and traditionalists. Briner stresses that having a mix of perspectives is essential for fully adopting new ideas and purposes.

The Impact of Purpose-Driven Companies:

Why should businesses embrace purpose? Briner presents compelling evidence to support the value of purpose-driven organizations. Millennials, who comprise a significant portion of the workforce, have a strong connection with purpose and are likelier to stay with purpose-oriented companies. Moreover, purpose-driven companies have higher shareholder returns than the S&P 500 average—additionally, products with sustainability and social benefits experience significantly higher growth rates than conventional products.

Becoming Purpose-Driven in Multiple Areas:

According to Briner, being purpose-driven is not merely a nice-to-have but a critical aspect for businesses. Purpose-driven marketing can be highly effective in B2B contexts if the messaging is clear and focused on impacting the world. Companies can engage prospects and significantly increase response rates by creating a platform for a meaningful conversation centered around purpose. To achieve this, companies should frame the conversation as a critical conversation brought to you by the company, ensuring a strong connection between the conversation and the organization.

Shifting Mindsets and Metrics:

Briner encourages top-level leaders to shift their approach and think outside their usual lanes. By interviewing candidates with purpose-driven responses and assessing their alignment with the company’s purpose, organizations can identify individuals who think beyond job descriptions and contribute to the larger mission. Shifting key metrics and reporting to measure a company’s impact is another crucial step in becoming purpose-driven. Regular impact updates to customers and measuring progress using surveys can help assess the company’s purpose-driven status before and after implementing initiatives and transformations.

Embracing Purpose to Drive Success:

Briner’s expertise, drawn from his experience transforming companies into purpose-driven organizations, demonstrates the tremendous power that purpose can unleash in businesses. Purpose-driven companies enjoy thriving ecosystems where employees feel strongly connected to the organization’s purpose and confidently contribute to its success. By aligning compensation structures, messaging, marketing, and content around their purpose, companies can create a brand that resonates with customers on a deeper level.

Unleashing the Power of Purpose-Driven Organizations: Insights from Colt Briner

Let’s now delve into a few key insights shared by Colt Briner and explore actionable takeaways that can help your organization unlock its purpose-driven potential.

1. Establishing Purpose: The Foundation for Success

Colt Briner emphasizes the importance of establishing purpose within a company. This starts with defining shared values and crafting a clear target, action, and results statement. Operationalizing purpose involves executive ownership and accountability for change across all functional areas. By conducting workshops and helping executives understand how their roles are connected to the company’s purpose, organizations can facilitate commitment to specific actions and reporting measures.

Actionable Takeaway: Conduct purpose workshops to help executives align their roles with the organization’s purpose, committing to specific actions and measures to track progress.

2. Overcoming Time Constraints: Embedding Purpose into the Fabric of Your Business

Time constraints can be a challenge for organizations looking to operationalize purpose. However, Colt Briner provides insightful suggestions to overcome this hurdle. By capturing client impact stories, integrating purpose into job descriptions and employee reviews, connecting department KPIs to the company’s purpose, and developing purpose-driven thought leadership content and solutions, organizations can effectively embed purpose into their day-to-day operations.

Actionable Takeaway: Explore ways to integrate purpose into various aspects of your organization, from job descriptions to KPIs to thought leadership content, to ensure that purpose becomes a central part of your business.

3. Broadening Stakeholder Engagement: Aligning Mindsets with Purpose

Internal stakeholder alignment is crucial for purpose-driven success. While some individuals are intrinsically motivated by purpose, others prioritize practical outcomes such as financial success. Balancing the mindset spectrum from innovators to institutionalists leads to fully adopting new ideas or purposes. This cross-department and cross-institutional harmony is essential for sustainability and avoiding catastrophic decision-making processes.

Actionable Takeaway: Foster a culture of purpose-driven thinking by seeking individuals who think about their work in terms of impact and purpose. Look for a balance of personality predispositions within your organization to ensure the full adoption of purpose.

4. Purpose-Driven Marketing in B2B: Creating Impactful Conversations

Purpose-driven marketing can be highly effective in the B2B context if done right. Colt Briner suggests creating a platform for conversation around a meaningful purpose. By framing the conversation as a critical discussion brought to you by your company, you create an effective arms-length relationship between the conversation and the company. This approach engages prospects and can significantly increase response rates.

Actionable Takeaway: Focus on engaging prospects through meaningful conversations centered around impact and the greater purpose rather than solely on your company or its products.

5. Shifting Mentality: Becoming Purpose-Driven

To become purpose-driven, organizations must undergo a mindset shift. Colt Briner encourages top-level leaders to think beyond their usual boundaries and embrace actions that align with purpose. Interviews are an effective tool to identify individuals who genuinely resonate with purpose-driven work. You can better connect with purpose-driven individuals by considering the impact and core human needs fulfilled by your products or services rather than solely focusing on their features or specifications.

Actionable Takeaway: Embrace purpose-driven thinking by considering the impact and human needs fulfilled by your products or services. Use interviews to identify individuals who align with purpose-driven work.

Conclusion:

The episode with Colt Briner shed light on the transformative power of purpose-driven organizations. Establishing purpose, embedding it within day-to-day operations, fostering stakeholder engagement, and embracing purpose-driven marketing are crucial steps in becoming a purpose-driven organization. By taking actionable steps aligned with these insights, businesses can ignite the extraordinary potential of purpose, attract top talent, build customer loyalty, and navigate uncertain times successfully.

Remember, becoming a purpose-driven organization is a continuous journey, and consistency in communicating and reinforcing the message of purpose is key. By aligning your organization’s actions, strategy, and messaging with its greater purpose, you can unlock long-term success and make a meaningful global impact.

Episode Takeaways:

1. Conduct purpose workshops to align executive roles with the organization’s purpose.

2. Integrate purpose into various aspects of the organization, including job descriptions, KPIs, and thought leadership content.

3. Seek individuals who think about their work regarding purpose and impact for stakeholder engagement.

4. Frame purpose-driven marketing conversations as critical discussions to engage prospects effectively.

5. Embrace a purpose-driven mindset by considering the impact and human needs fulfilled by your products or services.

In this episode, you will be able to:

• Embrace the value of shifting to a purpose-driven mentality for successful businesses.
• Discover hidden champions in your organization that embody a purpose-driven mindset.
• Learn the relationship between company culture and purpose in becoming a purpose-driven organization.
• Implement actionable tips that enhance your company’s transition to a purpose-driven approach.
• Gain insights into why a blend of innovators, early adopters, and institutionalists can benefit your company.

Some areas we explore in this episode include:

• Consider the impact your company is seeking to create in the world.
• Identify and articulate your company’s values.
• Engage your executive team in a discussion to arrive at an agreed alignment on your purpose.
• Shift your mentality to focus on adding value and customer impact.
• Identify purpose-driven individuals through interviewing to find those naturally predisposed to thinking about purpose.
• And much, much more.

Listen to the episode

Related links and resources

Connect with Colt

• LinkedIn

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