Getting Started with Sinek and Sivers

It was during the Summer that I first started watching TED talks and this talk by Simon Sinek is one of the first and most influential that I saw. It caused a major paradigm shift for me and began to change how I worked with people and led people. His phrase “people don’t buy what you do they buy why you do it” has shaped the way I approach problems and ideas. Shortly after watching this and learning about the Golden Circle I had a chance to put it into practice. I began developing the idea of using social media, specifically Twitter, within the College Council. I knew that as I was going through this idea I had to articulate why I was doing it and why I was using Twitter instead of Facebook. I started with the what in this case and had to work out the why to see if the what was worth attempting. There was opposition that helped me refine my why/how/what. Once I finally got to the point where I was presenting this idea to the other members I intentionally focused on telling them the why first. This made all the difference. Their reaction was very positive. There was such a difference in their reaction to the Twitter proposal compared with the reaction of our council advisor simply because I started with the why. Focusing on the why also helps me as a leader be open to other ideas. The ‘what’ that I come up with may not be the best one, but that’s okay. It is the why that really matters. The why is the most important part. The why has true impact on people, society, and the world. The what is a mostly vehicle for the why. Derek Sivers: How to start a movement
Simon Sinek: How great leaders inspire action