CEO, Entrepreneur, Business Innovator, and Philanthropist
Founder, Chairman of the Board, of CorePurpose
Blog:
Innovation is making life better for the people who matter - Joan Koerber - Walker
Joan’s built an awesome background in all those areas of small business, innovation, etc. She was CEO of Arizona Small Business Association where she worked with the talented team of staff and volunteers tackling challenges like health-care, workforce development, and growing local businesses as an economic development strategy.
Joan shares her passion and solutions for small business and innovation with her business Core Purpose . During the show she shared her stories of creativity and innovation driving small business growth and the jobs they create as a result.
Your passion is all about innovation, startups, change, growth. However, you grew up in a corporate family. In fact, maybe the world’s biggest corporation. GM. . Your dad was a GM executive. Your siblings are GM execs. You took the path less taken choosing instead to work one summer and then pursue technology and innovation. And you wrote a great post, A Family Affair - a personal GM perspective, that talked your perspective choosing then the uncertainty of technology, startups, dot-com bubbles...what did you tell your family? What was the reaction?
My passion is innovation, start-up and growth. She lived in the world of business and entrepreneurship. The challenge that we all face when just starting out is a path to follow. I was the oldest of five children with a wonderfully supportive family. I knew didn’t just want to go into GMwith her father and be “daddy’s little girl.”
There is a very famous quote from Charlie Wilson, the Chairman and CEO of General Motors, he said that he always believed what was good for GM was good for the country and vice versa. When we stop investing in innovation that will move us forward as opposed to keeping us in line, when we let our costs get out of control, when we stop looking at the business as a business and look at it as an enterprise, there is a big difference. When capital markets get out of control, these things were NOT good for GM, nor are they good for the country. They problems that we are seeing at GM right now are endemic in our structures of business and government. As we are looking at what we do now, we need to be asking how can we reduce costs, and how we collaborate to make things better?
On another blog post, you write: “Now more than ever we need to be focusing on the positive side of business. It starts with Conversations - Asking Questions - Forming Alliances - and most of all Building Solutions.” Main stream media disagrees with this completely; they are focusing on the negative side of business. They think focusing on the negative side of business is important. Maybe it’s just easier right now. Why’d you choose that first sentence as...really your core purpose?
This is my core purpose. If you are focusing on what is broken as an opportunity to fix it, to do something positive, to encourage growth, you have a lot more energy and momentum. You get much better results. You mustn’t grieve over what isn’t working. If you are positive and helpful, people want to work with you. If you know what you are talking about and take the time to do your homework, people will listen. As you start to look at how to pull these things together, I realized that positivity is the productive way to move forwards and engage.
What’s the role of positivity in a startup or small business or any business?
The balance is as you are building the culture in a business, you can choose your values, whether positive or negative and soon will discover that a positive culture breeds energy and success. Wanting a solid, strong business is difficult, but you are continually focusing on the negative, it becomes more drudgery and can create more internal downfalls. The positive culture emanates growth and a strong foundation, making it more difficult for a business to fail.
I love the second part of that quote: “It starts with Conversations - Asking Questions - Forming Alliances - and most of all Building Solutions.” What is the role of conversations in a business?
If you constantly look at your path, set a goal this is where we are going, and stop talking about it, you may fall into a big hole if you do not continually having those conversations and getting input. How else would you know what your customers or employees want? Asking questions is critically important or you can make costly errors.
Forming alliances, no matter the size of your business is vitally important. If you want to be successful, you have to know how to collaborate. Collaborations start with solid partnerships that benefit both sides. You need to learn how to form these relationships and build upon them – make them stronger.
Building solutions is about working together and creating value! If we start focusing on values based solutions, we can move forwards.
Why do so many companies stop having these conversations?
When times are tough, we tend to focus on survival. When times are good, we are focused on being busy. In both cases, sometimes we get too busy to have these conversations and it is here that time MUST be put aside, scheduled to have these talks, whether it is a company meeting, just open office hours or a dinner. Take the time to speak to your stakeholders, your employees, your managers and customers. Interact! Make a difference! Say thank you! Just start the conversation and gain back valuable information for the betterment of everyone.
How does a CEO foster an environment where questions are encouraged and how do employees ask questions without threatening their positions?
The culture of every company is different so the solutions may be different.
* Be constructive! Not argumentative or confrontational. It is about how you ask the question.
* Help people become the co-creator of the idea.
What is the difference between conversations in large and small companies?
It relates back to the culture. The differences are the opportunities to have the conversations with the people who are in a position of power to actually have those conversations make an impact.
The biggest organization in the US is the Federal Government, and you can reach out to different local politicians or groups, but it is highly unlikely that President Obama would take your call. The larger the corporation, the larger the levels or chain of command that you must go through to be heard.
You need to learn how to build alliances and form groups with people who have a shared interest to get those shared interests heard.
If you are in a smaller organization it is obviously much easier to just walk down the hallway and make those connections. There is less of a maze.
You need to build coalitions in all size companies, but it goes back to the culture of the company.
Some are so focused on tearing down boundaries, whether through message boards, blogs, community chats, monitoring their Twitter feed to discover whatever is necessary.
There are other companies that are more old fashioned or traditional, that choose to shut themselves off and become more less involved. It is important to keep the lines of communication open. Ask the questions. Engage your employees.
What is the impact of innovation on our economy?
Innovation is doing something in a new way to make life better for the people who matter. This ties back to your core purpose. Who matters are your employees, your customers, the people you partner with and the people who invested in you. If you can judge everything you do on creating value for those stakeholders, you can keep changing and innovating towards tremendous growth and success.
Creativity is critical to innovation! You have to think draw it back to you – what is going to have results now. It has to be practical in the present moment.
38:22
Describe your standard client and why they contact you.
Our standard client arecorporate clients who have a challenge and need help figuring out how to get over that challenge. Normally it is a business challenge where they had a plan and it did appear that it was going to work just fine, but now the path is not what it was intended to be. Companies come to Joan for help with the plan and solve those problems.
When working with smaller businesses, there isn’t such a large management team to consider, so many times there are meetings with the president or owner, employees, and others to collaborate and co-produce solutions to those particular challenges. You can have “all hands” meetings.
Their focus is on getting the businesses to be successful. The goal is not to break the company into smaller pieces but to “make the pie bigger.” Your message has to be simple enough to implement within the groups and organizations.
I share what I’ve learned to help the audience go back to their business and make the pie bigger. The second part is to assist people in working together and form coalitions to help each other. If you are not figuring out to build your alliances, then visit: www.corepurpose.com to get you started. It will give you ideas on collaboration, social media, and so forth to assist you with your ideas and how to move forwards.
Has your client base changed in the past 12-15 months?
The bigger companies tend to reach out more frequently because they can afford too. In today’s economy it is a little more difficult for smaller companies.
Why do companies find innovation so challenging?
Innovation brings change. Human beings in general don’t like change. From this standpoint, change can be seen as a threat. When you are trying to bring out innovation in an organization you must make the culture a safe place.
Let’s plan to talk next year. What are the changes we’ll talk about with health insurance and small business?
In the next 12 months we won’t see many changes. There is no agreement in Washington on what will be done. Whatever is the solution that comes out of their efforts will not be immediate. Because of the way healthcare laws are written and mandated by each individual state, small business health plans are a tremendous challenge to create on a national level. Each state has different structures and programs. If you put penalties on the small businesses, we will see many more uninsured individuals. We need to build solutions that will actually work.
I ask this question of everybody. Using Erika Andersen’s book, Being Strategic, and her term Reasonable Aspiration or hoped-for goal...what was your reasonable aspiration for starting Core Purpose in 2002?
When I started Core Purpose, I wanted to build a collaborative corporation that would help share ideas and grow companies. I believe we have accomplished this goal, while also adding other tremendous services and solutions.
Best quote:
You never know what you can accomplish until you try. Marie Carmichael, Joan’s Grandmother.
Best personal quote:
Core to reaching your goal is a clear vision.
When distractions blur the vision, and they will, refocus.
When doubt clouds the vision, which it does, take the time to stop and enlighten others.
When fear of failure threatens, find courage.
When guidance is needed, lead.
When teamwork is needed, trust.
When the goal is within reach, refine it, innovate, and reach further.
Comments