Where's the Value in Your Business at the End of the Day?

Are We Creating a Legacy?

I was in a Facebook group earlier this week discussing with some colleagues the work of a well-known business around creating a business that has value. It got me wondering what they meant by value, and what really is the ultimate legacy we can leave behind.

Many of the members agreed with the thesis that the value of a business is in what you can sell it for, and that we should be striving to systematise and remove ourselves as far as possible.

It's an argument that has some logic to it: money is a measure of value and therefore the more money a business is worth the more value it has.

But it's not how I run my business, or my life (at least it's not how I aim to even if I am not always successful!).

Woven Into the Lives of Others…

That same day I came across this quote which seemed to perfectly sum up what I was trying to put into words:

What you leave behind is not what is engraved in stone monuments, but what is woven into the lives of others.

The quote is from Pericles, Greek philosopher and politician, and the words seemed so relevant to the debate we'd been having on Facebook.

At the end of the day, the best we can hope is that we've had a positive impact on the people around us, whether that's our family and friends, our immediate connections, whether it's those we've worked with, or those we've worked for, perhaps the people we represent who are unable or unwilling to speak up.

I know it to be true that, if you build your business and your career this way, then you will create something great.

And, maybe, it will be something that also has monetary value.

If it comes down to a choice, I know which one I’d rather leave behind.

With love,

Cathy