Finding Meaning and Having Impact

Finding Meaning and Having Impact

I have the great pleasure of working for a company that helps worthy organizations raise money for their good work.  So this week, a very unusual but serendipitous event happened which involved an artist named Banksy who mysteriously “vandalized” and then returned a painting to a thrift shop in NYC.  The organization was quick to reach out to my company BiddingForGood and put this painting up for auction.  The auction culminated last night and the painting went for a cool $615,000. As I watched the bidding move up almost $300,000 in under 10 minutes, I was first struck with questions like “Who are these people?" “Who really has the kind of money to jump into a bidding war and spend over a half a million dollars on a painting in one night? “ With that kind of money, what else do they care about?  What are the causes they support?  What is the good work that they do in the world?  The good news about this particular auction is that a worthy non-profit, Housing Works, in Brooklyn, NY will be the recipient of the proceeds.  Housing Works stated mission is to address the dual crisis of homelessness and AIDS that still plagues our city streets. 

Then my thoughts quickly turned to the appreciation I feel for working for a company that can have this kind of impact in the world.  Ok, granted, we are just the software guys that provide the platform for this fundraising to occur, but we make it possible.   We make it happen and that has meaning for everyone who works for the company. 

So I reflect on having work with meaning and having impact.  Where and how does this happen in our lives?  If we are entrepreneurs, we create businesses that have impact.  We build companies around transformative ideas.  We are fueled by passion that drives us to work as hard as we do.  Where else do we see impact?  Teachers have impact.  Think about the great teachers in your life.  Doctors and nurses have impact.  For those who have battled illness of any kind, they know the difference that doctors and nurses can have in our health and recovery.  Artists certainly have impact as we saw from the auction tonight. As I reflect on my career, some of my most satisfying work has been at companies where there was tangible impact and meaning.  An unlikely example is Walking Magazine.  This magazine came at a time when the notion of walking for fitness was a new idea.  Companies like Nike and Reebok were just beginning to recognize walking as a legitimate fitness activity. We did a lot of work to shine a light on this practice and to show how beneficial it was becoming to so many different kinds of people.   I used to see a fitness walker bustling down the street and feel a strange sense of pride, as if we had actually had something to do with that.  Another chapter in my career that was perhaps even more profound was being at AltaVista in the very early days of the internet.  For those who remember, AltaVista was one of the first and most powerful search engines on the web.  We were a central part of the story during those early days. It was incredibly exciting to be part of something so profound that it was changing the way we live and learn and connect with one another.

Having been married to an architect for many years and having visited some of the beautiful buildings that he has designed- homes, libraries, university student centers, I have often been inspired by the imprint that he leaves behind.   How incredible to create something that lives on for years and years and breathes life into families, universities and even entire communities.

In really simple ways, we create meaning by growing gardens, by baking cookies, by cultivating friendships, by nurturing teams.  We create incredible meaning by having babies and raising happy and healthy children.  So today as I ponder who this person is who will spend over $600,000 in one night on a painting, I also reflect with appreciation on the opportunity to have impact in the world.   It’s a good way to make a living.