What Do You Stand For?

What Do You Stand For?

September 8, 2020

I often ask myself: What do I stand for? It’s a simple question that means a lot to me. Most companies identify a mission, but what about us as individuals? What do we stand for?

Identifying what we stand for is a better focus than identifying what we stand against. I don’t know what I’m fo, but I’m against racism! I’m against sexism! I’m against socialism! I’m against communism! I’m against capitalism! I’m against big government!

Where does that get us? What progress do we make by fighting things we are against? We end up divided and pitted against each other. There is no progress when we are fighting against something.

Progress comes when we rally around what we have in common when we fight for things we all stand for. That’s when we make real progress.

The founding fathers stood for no taxation without representation. Rosa Parks stood for an equal place on the bus. Susan B. Anthony stood for a woman’s right to vote. Martin Luther King, Gandhi, and Nelson Mandela all stood for non-violent direct action.

I would submit that every great accomplishment in our civilization’s history has come from people fighting for something rather than fighting against something. It’s about aspiration, not cancellation.

That’s what I want to focus on in this series of videos: What I stand for. How my beliefs influence the decisions I make as I strive to make things better for my clients through:

Equality

Accountability

Optimism

Pragmatism

Improvement

These five pillars reflect what I stand for. What do you stand for? Let’s talk.