Why We Do It And Why You Will Want To

September 15 & 16, 1990 represented the dawn of my professional life. I walked into a hotel ballroom to deliver the first Inspired Work Program to thirty-six participants. The program has the magic of getting people to break with their past and design an ideal relationship with their work. For two days I watched these remarkable souls diving into the process and emerging with dramatic improvements and new visions. I watched some of them walk in the door with a deep justification for their pain only to lose grip with that pain because a new and personalized vision pulled them forward. I related to everything happening with our participants because it was also happening to me. In that first program, all of us found at least the beginnings of the lives we were meant to have. It became clear that once we define the truth there is no going back.

A few months after we launched Inspired Work, one of the nation’s largest banks became a client. After years of success and stability, the CEO was looking for ways to manipulate more value into the shareholder’s pockets. That plan backfired and the bank no longer exists. Thousands of their ex-workers came through our programs. Most of these employees had what they believed were “jobs for life.” Some had so thoroughly bought into the promise that many of them came in wearing blue suits and stickpins with the bank’s logo.

Before the participants found new lives and renewed purpose, they had to navigate through the shock of having ten to thirty years of employment come to a swift (and often bitter), end.

Many of our participants got outcomes they never anticipated.

One of them was a young man who had become a senior finance executive. He was the first member of his family to go to college. In fact, he had earned an MBA from an Ivy-league school. He told us of growing up in a family of migrant workers. He did well in school and got a scholarship. But, his passion had never been to climb a corporate ladder and make a great deal of money.

At one point he whispered,

“All I ever wanted to do was to grow things.”

That weekend, he designed a new life. Today, he is a wealthy farmer growing premium lettuce for gourmet restaurants across the western seaboard.

Another gentleman had come into the program with his wife. He had been with the bank for almost thirty years. Now in his fifties, he was panicked about finding another job as a middle-aged man. But, on the second day of the program his demeanor had changed so completely that I asked what was going on with him.

He responded,

“I would like to make an announcement to the room.”

He continued by telling everyone he had always been in love with the world of art and that now, he would “devote the rest of his life to the art community.”

Years later, I would open up a copy of the Los Angeles Times and find his obituary which read,“John Morgan, Leader in the Los Angeles Art Community.”  He had gone on to open a charity, bringing art education to inner city schools. He raised millions for art museums and he opened up a successful gallery.

Later, his wife would share that for eighteen years, “He always left for work with a smile on his face.”

That was 15 years ago. That two-day program remains at the core of what we do, produces some of the world’s most outstanding satisfaction numbers in any business—92.6%—and has impacted organization’s such as The Walt Disney Company, University of Southern California, HBO, Sony Pictures Entertainment, Loyola Marymount University, The United Church of Religious Science, Morgan Stanley Smith Barney, Baxter Healthcare, The Art Institute and many others. Our teams have led over 40,000 people into defining the very lives they are meant to have and the means to succeed with those lives.

We believe work is a profound opportunity to become more fulfilled, contributive and successful. The program works for people from all walks of life because the curriculum literally wraps itself around you – your truth, your needs and your expectations are met.

Now when I get asked about my work, the exchange goes very differently. Perhaps the best example is what happened during an interview with Newsweek, when the journalist was moved to say,

“You sound so excited about your own work, what do you most love about it?”

My response was effortless:

“I get to be in the presence of miracles.”

This is why we do the program twenty-four years later.

This is why we encourage you to take the time to ponder, what would your life look like if you had a thoroughly satisfying and updated relationship with your work?

What would happen if you realized how to fluidly and effectively change your life?

We invite you to experience The Inspired Work Program on June 13 & 14.

In it, you will find ways to bring life to your deepest ambitions. Literally, you will scrape away the extraneous and emerge with a new outlook, a roadmap to transform your relationship towards work.

To enroll, call (310) 277-4850

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