Making Work Matter: How to Create Positive Change in Your Company and Meaning in Your Career
Nancy McGraw
Royal Oak Press (2024)

How to become a high-impact social intrapreneur

The results of all of the most recent major studies of employee satisfaction indicate that [begin italics] feeling appreciated [end italics] is either first or second when respondents rank what is of greatest importance to them. (The same is true of results of surveys of what is of greatest importance to customers.) Now consider this: Companies annually ranked among those most highly regarded and best to work for are also annually ranked among those most profitable, and have the greatest cap value in their industry segment.  Those who work for these peak performers feel that they and what they do matter; that they and what they do are appreciated.  These companies have high engagement and low attrition. Does yours?

Nancy McGaw founded and continues to lead the Aspen Institute First Movers Fellowship Program, the leading global network and professional development program for corporate social intrapreneurs. First Movers are accomplished innovators inside companies who are creating new products, services and management practices that increase business value and make the world a better place. Since 2009, the Fellowship Program has strengthened the capacity of social intrapreneurs to lead change within their company and industry, which collectively, over time, will redefine how business is done and how success is measured.

McGaw wrote Making Work Matter in order to help as many people as possible to become high-impact social intrapreneurs. That is, help prepare them to make a significant difference while learning a living. She provides an abundance of information, insights, and counsel that can help prepare leaders in almost any organization to achieve strategic objectives that include HOW TO

o Imagine organizational opportunities
o Discover (or rediscover) your organization’s purpose
o Reframe the problem(s) to be solved
o Map a journey for achieving change
o Seek “small wins” to generate momentum to achieve BIG improvements
o Tell stories that invite/encourage others to tell theirs

o Engage to spark/nourish collaboration
o Inquire with questions that ignite imaginations
o Listen to learn
o Dare to step up
o Reflect routinely on purpose
o Persist on the journey

McGaw makes brilliant use of several reader-friendly devices that include direct address (see this book’s subtitle) to establish and then sustain a personal rapport with her reader. Also, I commend her on her choice of quotations that are directly relevant to the given context. Here are four that caught my eye:

“Do not go where the path may lead, go instead where there is no path and leave a trail.” Ralph Waldo Emerson (Page 12)

“If I had an hour to save the world, I would spend 55 minutes defining the problem and five minutes finding solutions.” Albert Einstein (Page 45)

This observation reminds me of another, by Abraham Lincoln: “Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four sharpening the ax. ”

“No one can whistle a symphony. It takes an orchestra to play it.” E.E. Luccock (Page 104)

“Only those who risk going too far can find out how far to go.” T.S. Eliot (Page 148)

I presume to add another, an African  proverb “If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.”

In order to create positive change in your company and meaning in your career, it is not enough to become a social intrapreneur. You must also serve as a catalyst for organizational change. Margaret Mead once suggested, “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed, citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.” Nancy McGaw and the resources of the the Aspen Institute First Movers Fellowship Program can help you recruit others in efforts to create positive change.

Take heart.  “Don’t give up. Wait for the light. You might even look to the universe to give you a boost. By accepting the call to adventure and setting out on your arduous journey, you will be helping companies realize their potential for making a positive impact on the world. And you will be blazing a path for other intrapreneurs to follow.

“You will also find that you are doing work that matters — to you, to your company, and to society.”

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Here are two suggestions while you are reading Making Work Matter: First, highlight key passages Also,  perhaps in a lined notebook kept near-at- hand, record your comments, questions, action steps (preferably with deadlines), page references, and lessons you have learned as well as your responses to key points posed within the narrative (e.g. quotations that are relevant to chapter focus).  Also record your responses to specific or major issues or questions addressed, especially at the conclusion of chapters.

These two simple tactics — highlighting and documenting — will facilitate, indeed expedite frequent reviews of key material later.