Greetings!

Since the close of the campaign, I've been diligently writing on Chief Leadership Officer plus talking with potential publishers.  

Publishing Update

Thanks to your angel investment, the Campaign has certainly positioned me with better options to negotiate or go independently. Initial conversations with publishers are going well. Given my prior publishing experience and capacity to self-publish, I'm looking for an exceptional relationship. Time will tell. 

Writing Update

On the writing front, I admit it is always a struggle to write.  I tend to have 10x more to say than actually makes it into the book. Writing is such a time of thinking, researching and learning. I write for 4 or 5 hours one day; edit the content in half the next day, and then rewrite it all again the third day in order to produce a concise chapter with 1500 to 2000 words. William Faulkner is attributed as saying, "In writing, you must kill all your darlings." So true! It all feels so unproductive, yet consistency does eventually produce a chapter and, eventually, a manuscript.

“In writing, you must kill all your darlings.”
                        William Faulkner

Currently, I am writing about "Why business exists." This writing leans upon my On-Purpose® approach and books. Through the years, however, I recognize that we in the business community have tended to rely upon a shallow, incomplete understanding as stand-ins for true purpose and contribution to societal advancement. 

"Self-interest" is part of the free-enterprise system and Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations. We've come to a place where we have such an austere concept of "self-interest" that it has become a norm pressing dangerously into selfishness and self-aggrandizement.  The counteracting attempt is to speak in terms of "enlightened self-interest," a term similar to a benevolent dictator.  

Actually, "self-interest" is the right phrase once a more robust appreciation for it is personally developed and refined.  The ironic twist of human nature is that taking an interest in another person is part of self-interest. We give it names such as generosity, service, care and love.

Most of us, however, are so consumed paying bills as the focus of our "self-interest" that our marginal bandwidth of time, resources, and energy is depleting us into a cornered state of despair and self-preservation. We're so empty and living in scarcity that we sacrificially force ourselves to get beyond our immediate needs to serve our neighbors and the greater good. And we carry such a poverty of living into our businesses.

Serving society is not designed to be a compartmentalize activity allocated in the course of conducting business.  Rather, advancing the well being of society is the forgotten origins of business breathing life and meaning into every relationship, operational detail and line item on the financial statement... on-purpose. To jumble an old expression, "The tail has become our understanding of the dog."

The more I write Chief Leadership Officer, the more I abhor my perpetual 24/7 state of busyness and narrowing self interest into unhealthy individualism. Am I trading my precious health and relationships for the next deal and then the next in pursuit of fame and fortune for my own sake and "security" or for a greater good?  Writing stirs the soul!

My hope is that Chief Leadership Officer will help us all lead with greater confidence into the emerging Age of Purpose and to be profit-makers in the fullest meaning of the word. As forward facing as this book is, it actually draws upon many
forgotten (archaic!) principles of the past by casting them into a contemporary context and language. I feel a great sense of responsibility to get this book right. I also feel a need to get it done! Writing is a high risk investment. Your participation helps mitigate a portion of that.

Your continued prayers and support are deeply appreciated. 

Be On-Purpose!
Kevin