Start with Why: How Great Leaders Inspire Everyone to Take Action

by Simon Sinek

This book is not designed to tell you what to do or how to do it. Its goal is not to give you a course of action. Its goal is to offer you the cause of action.

There are only two ways to influence human behavior: you can manipulate it or you can inspire it.

Price always costs something. The question is, how much are you willing to pay for the money you make?

There is a big difference between repeat business and loyalty. Repeat business is when people do business with you multiple times. Loyalty is when people are willing to turn down a better product or a better price to continue doing business with you.

WHY: Very few people or companies can clearly articulate WHY they do WHAT they do. When I say WHY,

I don’t mean to make money—that’s a result. By WHY I mean what is your purpose, cause or belief? WHY does your company exist? WHY do you get out of bed every morning? And WHY should anyone care?

But when a company clearly communicates their WHY, what they believe, and we believe what they believe, then we will sometimes go to extraordinary lengths to include those products or brands in our lives.

to include those products or brands in our lives.

The goal of business should not be to do business with anyone who simply wants what you have. It should be to focus on the people who believe what you believe. When we are selective about doing business only with those who believe in our WHY, trust emerges.

Trust begins to emerge when we have a sense that another person or organization is driven by things other than their own self-gain.

When we share values and beliefs with others, we form trust. Trust of others allows us to rely on others to help protect our children and ensure our personal survival.

It’s not products or services that bind a company together. It’s not size and might that make a company strong, it’s the culture—the strong sense of beliefs and values that everyone, from the CEO to the receptionist, all share. So the logic follows, the goal is not to hire people who simply have a skill set you need, the goal is to hire people who believe what you believe.

This was not luck. This was because Shackleton hired good fits. He found the right men for the job. When you fill an organization with good fits, those who believe what you believe, success just happens. And how did Shackleton find this amazing crew? With a simple ad in the London Times.

“You don’t hire for skills, you hire for attitude. You can always teach skills.”

The role of a leader is not to come up with all the great ideas. The role of a leader is to create an environment in which great ideas can happen.

only when individuals can trust the culture or organization will they take personal risks in order to advance that culture or organization as a whole.

It is the invisible trust that gives a leader the following they need to get things done. And in Lori Robinson’s case, things get done.

The goal of business then should not be to simply sell to anyone who wants what you have—the majority—but rather to find people who believe what you believe, the left side of the bell curve.

You don’t just want any influencer, you want someone who believes what you believe. Only

Energy motivates but charisma inspires.

The vision is the public statement of the founder’s intent, WHY the company exists. It is literally the vision of a future that does not yet exist. The mission statement is a description of the route, the guiding principles—HOW the company intends to create that future.

It’s no coincidence that the three-dimensional Golden Circle is a cone. It is, in practice, a megaphone. An

He sees a world in which people accept the lives they live and do the things they do not because they have to, but because no one ever showed them an alternative.

He believed that if he looked after people, people would look after him. The more Wal-Mart could give to employees, customers and the community, the more that employees, customers and the community would give back to Wal-Mart.

“Find some humor in your failures. Don’t take yourself so seriously. Loosen up and everybody around you will loosen up.”

Every single one of these successful business owners knew WHAT they did. They knew HOW they did it. But for many, they no longer knew WHY.

Just because somebody makes

a lot of money does not mean that he necessarily provides a lot of value.

But again, value is a perception, not a calculation,

“We’re in the business of building an organization, an institution that we hope will be here fifty years from now. And paying good wages and keeping people working with you is very good business.”

But when you compete against yourself, everyone wants to help you.

And what if the next time someone asks, “Well, why should I do business with you then?” we answer with confidence, “Because the work we’re doing now is better than the work we were doing six months ago. And the work we’ll be doing six months from now will be better than the work we’re doing today.