Shared purpose is more than a mission statement.Shared purpose is a deeply felt agreement about
what a group hopes to achieve together. For
example, one community group we worked with
agreed that they “exist to support people who want
to make our neighborhoods a better place to live.”
For another client, the shared purpose of the group
was to “guarantee access to health care and
eliminate health disparities.”
We believe that a shared sense of purpose allows
groups and communities to effectively make change
for two reasons. First, it enables the group to have a
collective sense of why it is working together.
Second, it allows individuals to independently make unique contributions that help the group move closer to achieving its shared aspirations.
Public leaders play a critical role in creating the space that enables groups to reflect on and talk about shared purpose. Public leaders must help those in the group make sincere efforts to understand one another’s most deeply held aspirations.
Conocer supports the development of a group's or community's shared purpose by working with public leaders to:
- Uncover the diverse perspectives on an issue
- Synthesize disparate points of view to a coherent whole
- Identify what the group is collectively trying to achieve
- Find ways to account for diverse perspectives
- Spread and strengthen the group’s shared purpose