Scaling with Purpose Kit: Using Purpose to Guide Growth and Expansion

**SPEAKER_1** (0:04)
The Bliss Business Podcast, the show about empathy, connection, and consciousness in business. Today's episode is brought to you by Zero Company, your paid search, social media, and programmatic ad experts.

**Stephen Sakach** (0:17)
Well, come back to The Bliss Business Podcast series, Scaling with Purpose. These are our short 10 to 15 minute podcast episodes where we explore how to embed purpose into every level of your organization. I'm Stephen Sakach here with Tullio Siragusa and Ash Maher. Hey, guys.

**Tullio Siragusa** (0:35)
Hey, good to be back.

**Stephen Sakach** (0:37)
So we were going to explore the product development topic, but we decided instead we're going to explore using purpose to guide growth and expansion. How do you scale your business without losing your soul? Let's get into it.

**Ash Maher** (0:50)
Thanks, Stephen. So there's this temptation during periods of growth to chase opportunities, new partnerships, markets that promise short-term success. But the challenge is that without a strong filter, growth can dilute your values, confuse your message, and disconnect your people from the overall mission.

**Tullio Siragusa** (1:09)
Exactly. We've seen it again and again where companies expand fast but they lose their core purpose and then the culture gets fragmented. Then by the time that happens, it's really hard to really back in.
Customers feel that change. What attracted them to do business with you to begin with changes, and they're like, what happened to this business? So employees begin to question what the company really stands for, and growth without grounding is very risky.

**Stephen Sakach** (1:43)
Yeah. That's why purpose is so critical at this stage. It acts like your compass, your North Star. It doesn't restrict growth. It clarifies it, and it helps leadership and teams evaluate opportunities with higher order question. Does this expansion help us serve our purpose more effectively? So let's talk about how purpose can be used as a filter to guide decisions. So when you're evaluating a new product line, a merger, maybe an expansion, or even hiring a new executive team, here are some questions you can ask. So first, does this align with our core values and mission? Then will this deepen or dilute our impact like Ash mentioned? Does this opportunity strengthen the relationship we have with the people we serve? Those are three important questions, I think.

**Ash Maher** (2:43)
Yeah, I was going to say those are massively important questions. So a great example of this was a company called Bombus, the sock and apparel company. Their purpose is rooted in dignity, specifically ensuring comfort and essentials for people experiencing homelessness. For every item purchase, they donate an item to someone in need. As they've expanded from socks into t-shirts and underwear, every decision has been filtered through that purpose. Now, they've worked closely with shelters and nonprofits to ensure product design meets real needs, not just market trends, and it's that commitment that's helped them scale their impact and deepen customer loyalty.

**Stephen Sakach** (3:20)
Yeah, Bombas' original goal, I think, was 1 million socks donated in 10 years, and a couple of years ago, they surpassed that with 100 million clothing items donated in that 10 years. Tullio, yeah, that's pretty amazing. Tullio, how about another example?

**Tullio Siragusa** (3:38)
One more that I love is Kickstarter.
Their purpose was and is still to help bring creative projects to life. And as they've grown, they've resisted monetizing it in ways that would dilute that mission. So they've stayed on point. They've made deliberate choices like becoming a public benefit corporation, or investing in creator education. And this has all been designed to ensure that growth serves the creative community. They've stayed true to that community, not just the shareholders. Oddly enough, as they are true to the creative community, they've also been true to the shareholders as a result. It's funny how that always works out that way. So, you know, every product or feature launch gets vetted by whether it helps creators, not just the platform bottom line, and that's so key. And the clarity of purpose has built massive trust with both creators and the backers as well. And that speaks to high integrity when you operate a business that way. And a business with high integrity is a business you can trust.

**Stephen Sakach** (4:46)
Yeah. And all this doesn't mean saying no to growth. It means saying yes to aligned growth. It's about choosing the kind of growth that will reinforce your culture, not strain it. And when teams understand that, they make more consistent long-term decisions that stay true to the company's identity. So let's talk a little bit about embedding that purpose into expansion plan. So how do you actually operationalize this? So first, obviously, you need to make your purpose visible in every kind of conversation. And don't leave it on a wall or in a slide deck. It should be the kind of the opening lens and closing lens for every major initiative you're undertaking.