Why things fall apart when there's no shared purpose

Yesterday I blogged about how the military is incredibly effective at innovating and breaking every rule in the book when they're at war, when they have a clear purpose and mission. They just don't know how to do it when they're at peace, when their is no clear purpose or mission.

Image by BrianR via Flickr

I've learned that crises play the same role in most organizations as wars and peacekeeping missions do for the military - and that may be why most organizations spend so much of their time stressed out in crisis.  When there's no crisis, they're not really sure what to do.

I learned this (again, at a deeper level) while I was working with a leadership team of an organization in the midwest last week.  We spoke of how people came together, listened to each other and made things work when things hit the fan.  The problem was that, before things hit the fan all of that wasn't happening.  Each person/department was going off in their own direction, focused on what was important to them, and those things were often not in alignment with each other. They had no common shared purpose (that they fully bought in to) that framed all their individual tasks and gave meaning to them.

When a crisis hit, they came together with a shared purpose and worked together wonderefully.  When the crisis passed, they went back to their own silos and priorities.

This organization is not unusual - in fact, it's pretty typical.  Our conversations just helped me realize once again the incredible need for a shared purpose that everyone buys in to and lives (ie: not one that stops being relevant once someone stops reading the fancy plaque on the wall).

Is that why so much of North America lives in one crisis after another? 

That's my 2 cents. What do you think?