Insights from Vistage Chair: Andrea Simon
As a corporate anthropologist, I’ve spent much of my career observing how leaders build organizations. Over the past several years, I’ve had the privilege of interviewing and working with hundreds of women entrepreneurs, CEOs, and business owners.
Anthropologists look for patterns in how people adapt to changing environments.
Here is one that continues to intrigue me.
Today, some of the most successful women I meet are not choosing between profit, people, and purpose.Instead, they seem to build their companies around three enduring commitments: profits, people, and purpose.
Profits matter because healthy businesses create opportunities. They generate the resources to innovate, invest, hire talented people, and weather inevitable challenges.
People matter because culture is built one relationship at a time. These leaders invest in developing others, creating trust, and helping people grow alongside the business.
Purpose matters because it answers a larger question: Why does this business deserve to exist? It gives customers, employees, and the leader herself something meaningful to believe in.
What fascinates me is that these are not competing priorities.They reinforce one another.I’ve seen this repeatedly in my work. One woman who I interviewed tells the story of her unexpected arrival at a prospective employer’s door after her plane was delayed. She somehow managed to sneak in and get an interview – and a job. She kept that feeling of navigating rough waters into her own business, Her name is Rashmi Chaturvedi, and she has built an amazing, and successful business.
Rashmi Chaturvedi is co-founder of KAYGEN and UPTEMPO. She has built KATYGEN in the data science world, while also creating innovative opportunities for women in STEM through UPTEMPO. UTPEMPO enables women to receive mentorship, professional development, and pathways into careers where they have historically been underrepresented. Her business creates value for clients while expanding opportunities for others.
I heard the same philosophy from Diedre Windsor, founder of Windsor Group. Diedre built Windsor Group into one of the nation’s fastest-growing women-owned businesses by proving that business success and community impact can grow together.
Under her leadership, the company has expanded its professional services while creating opportunities for veterans, women, and underserved communities. Whether helping connect historically underserved farmers with federal assistance, mentoring emerging entrepreneurs, or investing in nonprofits and workforce development, Windsor has demonstrated that sustainable growth comes from strengthening the communities a business serves. Her philosophy is clear: profitability creates the capacity to broaden opportunity, invest in people, and leave a lasting legacy of positive impact.
That simple statement captures something important.
Profit isn’t the opposite of purpose.
Profit makes purpose sustainable.
People have to make it all happen.
Perhaps that’s the larger lesson.
The strongest organizations aren’t built by choosing between profits, people, and purpose.
They thrive because leaders understand that each strengthens the other.
I’d love to hear your thoughts.
Have you found these three commitments shaping your own leadership journey? Are you already deep into a Profit, People, Purpose mindset or just beginning to develop your own? It often comes at moments when you least expect it—a conversation, an ask, a moment of reflection. I look forward to learning more from each of you.
Andi