People, Planet, Profit – Putting People First

Written by Deborah Rozman, President and CEO of Quantum Intech, Inc. (dba HeartMath Inc.) Wednesday, 08 June 2011 05:03

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So, what does putting people first really mean?

Many companies have mission statements hanging on the wall espousing values that put people first, but if you ask the staff, those values often are not manifesting in the company culture.

Too often, CSR focuses on the important issue of environmental sustainability (planet) before people sustainability. Or, making more profit as an excuse for compromising care for people – their most valuable resource. Care for people does not require providing benefits that a company cannot afford. In our research at HeartMath, we found that the missing “X factor" in manifesting values often is lack of emotional self-management and emotional alignment between executives, management and staff.

Intention without emotional alignment compromises an organization’s ability to actualize its potential for people, revenue and mission (impact).

Emotions are one of the last taboos to be addressed in business. Yet, behind most dysfunctional companies, we find a lack of emotional management within the CEO or other key leaders, which creates a lack of alignment within the company. When a company is under emotional mismanagement, collaborations fail, commitment erodes, productivity wanes and innovation languishes.

Some executives are realizing the need to deal with toxic emotions, but don’t know how. Fortunately, there are best practices that enable executives and employees to learn workplace emotional self-management skills, with profound stress relief and performance benefits.

Emotional self-management is not repressing or venting emotions, but learning how to manage trigger reactions, judgments and blame – all of which can drain energy and keep people confined to limiting mindsets and not aligned with each other. Lack of emotional alignment cuts off the "heart,” which is the source of cooperation, passion and creativity.

Emotional Alignment – Key to Sustainability

Emotional alignment comes from heart-based interactions. This interaction can be between a person’s own mind and heart or between people trying to build an effective team or fulfill a social mission. HeartMath has been a leader in providing and assessing heart-based tools and programs that help companies achieve emotional self-management, emotional alignment and sustainability.

Creating, managing, and sustaining mission alignment is a signature of effective CSR leadership. Really putting people first in “People, Planet, Profit” creates the alignment needed to sustain sustainability.