How Stewardship Creates Both Impact And Belonging In The Workplace

Steward businesses, at their core, are all about two essential elements of stewardship

The Capurso Winery is a fifth-generation family vineyard on the outskirts of Verona, Italy. Founded in 1896, it sits on forty pristine acres nestled amid rolling green hills, not far from where Romeo and Juliet (allegedly) fell in love. When visiting the winery in 2019, I had the opportunity to tour the grounds and talk with the daughter of the owner who operates the winery while raising the sixth generation on the property. Marveling at the scenery as well as the longevity of these family vineyards, I asked her, “What is the secret of a five-generation business?”

She looked at me, thought for a moment, and said, “It is one word.”  My mind raced through all the possible catchwords she might toss out: family, vision, commitment, profit, wine (alcohol).  She said, “The secret is passion.”  She then defined passion to me in a way that revolutionized how I saw both business and life: “It is a beautiful work, but it is also very hard. You have to both lookup and see the beauty, and then look down and do the work.”
 

As you look at enduring businesses, two essential characteristics begin to emerge: investment and transcendence. Put another way, organizations that thrive in the long run are invariably filled with women and men who are fully invested in something bigger than themselves. They don’t see themselves as disengaged employees driven by profits but as deeply engaged stewards drawn by purpose. For them, the why and the who of these businesses always come before the what or the how of those businesses.  At the Capurso Winery, you see these two essential building blocks of stewardship on full display. For them, the transcendent element is beauty and that beauty drives deep engagement and hard work. By keeping the two in balance, the Capursos have successfully operated their vineyard for more than 120 years. 

Businesses with a mindset and mentality of stewardship will likely become the most impactful and enduring organizations in the future.  Steward businesses, at their core, are all about two essential elements of stewardship: Purpose and people.

Clear Purpose

Most of the non-steward world operates within an “if/then” mindset. In other words, if I do X, then Y will happen, or if I do A, then the world/others will do B. This mindset renders life mechanical, transactional, and outcome-based. In contrast, businesses that operate with a stewardship mentality have a clear knowledge of who they are, what they value, and what they believe and operate with a “because/therefore” view of the world. This unique perspective makes life infinitely more relational, intentional, and transcendent. “Because” (that value or perspective that is transcendent) leads to “therefore” (deep personal investment).

Transcendence is the driver and the stewards within the business are the agents, investing their energies in something bigger than themselves. The expectations are on the self, not on the outcome: Because we value X as a business, I, therefore, expect myself to do Y. 

A because/therefore orientation also makes decision-making easier. A few years ago I worked with a very successful family office that had recently sold a major asset that had been the focus of decades of hard work and effort. It was an asset that carried with it tremendous name-brand recognition and value in the marketplace. As they prepared to launch into the next phase of their business, they ended up settling on three values that they felt had marked their brand in the past and that they wanted to continue to mark it moving forward: Loyalty, integrity, and excellence. Later in the day, they started to debate the merits of a particular investment they had been contemplating for months. The project had substantial upside as well as the potential for very solid cash flow. However, it was going to require expending a large amount of time and effort in a location geographically remote from their current operations. I asked them a single question to help them clarify their thinking: “Can you do this new proposed project with excellence?”

“No,” the CEO of the family office immediately responded. “It’s decided, then. We aren’t going to do the project.” While they could have made significant profits, they realized that they couldn’t execute the project with the excellence they wanted their brand to represent. When viewed through the lens of their three transcendent values, their decision-making became clear, straightforward, and simple. By not investing in this project, they were able to keep their energy and resources available for those projects and opportunities that checked off all three of their essential values.

Cohesive People

Within a business, cohesion is the sense of being a united whole with shared connection and commonality. Cohesive businesses have employees who feel they are an important part of the group, they forge bonds more easily, and they treat others with respect. The difference between simply having a job with co-workers and having intention with a sense of cohesion is the addition of purpose. Once you have that clear sense of purpose, you can use that purpose to build deep and meaningful cohesion, which leads to higher retention, more engaged employees, and greater impact.

One of the most important things to understand about cohesion, and why steward businesses focus on both purpose and people, is that there are actually two types of cohesion: social cohesion and task cohesion. Social cohesion is the emotional connection a group feels on a relational level—their sense of friendship, closeness, and caring. People in groups with high social cohesion enjoy spending time together and feel a strong attachment to one another. Task cohesion, on the other hand, is the connection a group feels when they work together on a shared purpose or common challenge. Task cohesion has to do with a group’s commitment to completing a specific goal or objective.

From a social standpoint, cohesion can be developed by taking a step back from the myriad differences that divide us and finding shared values, experiences, or associations. Identifying areas where we can agree, or positive experiences we can share, can help develop social cohesion within a group. While social cohesion can be a powerful force, it is not without its potential negative side effects, which can include a desire for conformity (so that you appear to be an integrated member of the group), groupthink, and over-socializing—which can hamper a group that desires to be productive in addition to sociable. Social cohesion also tends to be easy for extroverts but may be more difficult for introverted individuals, which can further limit its effectiveness. Finally, in a diverse world with people from different backgrounds and experiences, social cohesion can be difficult to achieve.

The second way to build cohesion is through task cohesion, which relates to the commitment to achieve a purpose or goal in a collective manner. Task cohesion can be found in sports teams, military platoons, purposed businesses, visionary nonprofit organizations, and even within certain highly intentional families and groups of friends. There are two potential benefits to focusing on task cohesion in addition to, or even in place of, social cohesion.

First, task cohesion typically results in higher performance than social cohesion. Researchers who have studied high-performing sports teams found that teams with a stronger sense of cohesion tended to significantly outperform those with lower levels of cohesion. Beyond achieving better performance, highly cohesive, task-oriented groups interact more with each other, develop more supportive and communicative climates, are friendlier and more cooperative, and have a greater belief that their personal and group goals are being met than low-cohesion groups.

Second, task cohesion can overcome many of the differences that can stymie groups attempting to rely on social cohesion. Instead of straining mightily to find similarities within a diverse group, which can become especially trying in larger numbers, focusing on a meaningful task can naturally bring groups to a high state of cohesion. For example, strong task cohesion is often found in the military, where individuals from a wide variety of backgrounds, lifestyles, beliefs, and perspectives find that working together, especially in perilous situations, brings a sense of cohesion that can last a lifetime.

Businesses that employ a stewardship mentality can reap several powerful benefits. By clearly articulating their transcendent purpose, they can both bring simplicity to decision-making and attract like-minded employees. In addition, that purpose can be used to create enhanced commonality and cohesion within their people, allowing those businesses to get the complimentary benefits of both unity and diversity.

David R. York is the author of the forthcoming book, The Gift of Lift: Harnessing the Power of Stewardship to Elevate the World. David is an attorney, CPA, and managing partner of York Howell & Guymon, named an Inc. 5000 Fastest-Growing Company.  He works with closely held business owners and ultra-high net worth clients in the areas of tax and estate planning. He has co-authored two nonfiction books (Entrusted: Building a Legacy That Lasts and Riveted: 44 Values that Change the World), given a Ted Talk, and is a frequent national speaker. Visit www.davidryork.com