Do our people want more than profit?
Ask people why they chose a job and salary comes up. Ask why they stayed, and the answer is usually something else.
Every firm needs to make money. Without it there are no pay rises, no graduate programs, no new studios and no buffer for the lean years our industry knows well. Profit matters.
But when we listen to people talk about why they joined a firm, and especially why they stayed, profit rarely comes up. What comes up is the work, the people, and whether the place stands for something.
Picture a graduate weighing up two offers. The salaries are within a few thousand dollars of each other. One firm talks about its pipeline and growth targets. The other talks about the communities it designs for, the work its team chooses to give back through, and how it checks it’s living up to what it says. Most of us know which one we would have leaned towards at that age, and plenty of us would lean the same way now.
In our recent conversation with James Kelly, Co-Managing Partner at ClarkeHopkinsClarke (CHC), he put it simply:
“Business is not just for business. You’re not here to make just money.”
James Kelly, CHC
Most leaders would nod along
Most leaders would agree with that. Very few of us would say profit is the only reason our firm exists. The real question is whether our people can see the rest of it.
James was clear that it shows up first in who wants to join. Talking about CHC’s B Corp certification, he said: “When it comes to team members coming in, though, it’s almost the number one thing you hear in an interview.” Candidates aren’t only asking what they’ll be paid. In his words:
“It’s often not about salary, it’s not about all the perks and things like that. It’s about what do we do? What’s our culture? What do we believe in?”
James Kelly, CHC
It shows up in who stays, too. Almost a quarter of CHC’s 210 people have been there more than seven years. That kind of loyalty is hard to buy with perks.
Why it matters more now
Our industry runs in cycles. When work is plentiful, people move for the next opportunity. When it slows, firms make hard calls about where to focus and who to keep. Either way, a clear sense of direction is what holds a team together.
There’s also a generational shift. People coming into the built environment now have grown up with climate change, housing affordability and questions about who our cities are really built for. Many of them chose this industry because they want their work to mean something. If they can’t see that in the firm they join, they’ll go looking for it somewhere else.
Purpose isn’t only about the big picture either. It’s the everyday sense that the projects we take on, the clients we work with and the way we treat each other line up with what we say we care about.
Saying it isn’t the same as living it
Most firms have a purpose statement somewhere. The harder part is making it real. James was honest about this:
“It’s all well and good to talk about it, but you need to be able to prove and measure in a tangible way what you are doing.”
James Kelly, CHC
For CHC, B Corp certification is one way of doing that, with someone dedicated to tracking the firm’s impact. Not every firm needs to go down that path. Every firm can ask whether its people could name something it does that isn’t about the bottom line, and whether they’d describe it the same way the leadership team would.
How we can get better at this
It often starts with a conversation. Asking our teams what they think we stand for, and really listening to the answer, can be one of the most useful things a leadership group does. If the answers are vague, or different from what’s written in the strategy, that’s worth knowing.
It helps to connect purpose to the decisions people actually see: which projects we pursue, how we give back, how we support graduates and how we handle the tough times. People notice when a value costs the firm something and it sticks to it anyway.
It also helps to talk about it. Many firms do good work in their communities and rarely mention it internally. Sharing those stories in team meetings, in onboarding and in interviews helps people understand what they’re part of.
Finally, it’s worth checking in over time. Purpose drifts quietly when a business gets busy. A simple question in a staff survey, or a standing item at the leadership offsite, keeps it on the table.
More than profit
None of this means profit doesn’t matter. A firm that isn’t viable can’t do much for its people or its communities. The point James makes is that profit and purpose aren’t competing. A clear sense of why we exist helps us attract good people, keep them, and get through the lean times together.
At CHC, that shows up in a practice where people stay for years and candidates ask about purpose before perks. For the rest of us, it might start with one simple question: if we asked our team what we stand for beyond the numbers, what would they say?
Related reading: Are we losing the art of a phone call?
Want to talk this through with peers? Our Owners & Practice Leaders and HR & People industry groups meet regularly. Find your group.
