In this chapter, Sinek reinforces the process of following WHY by tracing it through three examples: Apple, the English longbow, and his own journey to becoming a mentor and coach.
Apple has put WHY first since its inception. When Apple first started, Steve Wozniak and Steve Jobs saw the company as a way to give individuals power.
At the time, companies held a monopoly on computing, and Jobs and Wozniak believed that by empowering individuals with computing power, they could change the world. Igniting revolutions by empowering people became the company’s WHY!
Just like the company, all of Apple’s products and their launches have started with WHY:
Apple’s constant commitment to their WHY has created incredibly loyal employees and customers who are drawn to their beliefs.
Note, not everyone is--even though Apple is a leader in the industry, they only hold about 2.5 percent of the personal computer market share. But starting with WHY isn’t about converting everyone.
And yet, Apple is still one of the most valuable tech companies in the world. And it all comes from pursuing the company’s values and vision in everything they do.
Here’s a different example that shows how starting with WHY a) has always worked and b) is effective outside of business, too.
In 1415, King Henry V of England was marching into the Battle of Agincourt, one of the deciding battles of the Hundred Years’ War between England and France. Henry had already lost 40 percent of his troops, and he was about to square off against a much bigger, much healthier French army.
And yet, the English one because they had one piece of technology the French didn’t: the longbow. Archers could stand out of range of French artillery and still deliver devastating volleys of arrows onto the battlefield. The longbow created a tipping point.
But the arrows and bows themselves weren’t the tipping point: it was the arrow’s momentum.
And yet again, the momentum doesn’t come originally from the arrow flying forward--the momentum develops when the arrow is pulled backward and cocked into place.
The same thing applies to a company or organization, too. While it’s tempting to look forward and planning out how to get there, the power of WHY comes from looking inside your organization and figuring out your beliefs first.
And that starts with you.
Finally, Sinek shares his own experience and how he got to WHY in his personal life and his career.
He explains that in 2005, he found himself struggling. He’d founded his business in 2002, even though he knew that 90 percent of new businesses fail in the first three years. But he wasn’t deterred.
Over the next three years, his company stayed afloat and even succeeded. Sinek thought they beat the odds.
But the fourth year was a different story. The novelty of running a business had worn off. He’d lost his passion and his WHY, which left him demoralized and depressed. Imposter syndrome set in, and Sinek became convinced he was a failure.
It took meeting Victoria Duffy Hopper, who explained the limbic brain and neocortex to him, to change his perspective. Suddenly, Sinek realized why people do what they do—which is the secret behind effective marketing. In that moment, he rediscovered his WHY.
From there, he made sure that his WHY motivated all of his business decisions. Sinek went from worrying that he was failing to speaking about The Golden Circle and WHY all over the world. But more importantly, he explains that the only thing he changed was his mentality. By starting with WHY, he not only recaptured his own passion, he found himself is a position to inspire others, too. WHY has been Sinek’s path to success, and now he’s sharing it with you.