You should be able to articulate your company’s purpose succinctly, in one or two sentences. This is called a “Statement of Purpose.” A statement of purpose should quickly and clearly convey why your company exists, how it fills basic human needs and impacts the world.

A good purpose statement is broad, fundamental, inspirational, and enduring. It should serve to guide your organization for at least 100 years. It should serve to guide your organization for at least 100 years.

Figuring out your purpose requires actual reflection on both your own desires and the audience you want to serve. After all, doing business boils down to serving others in a mutually beneficial way. Customers give you money, gratitude, and a shared passion, and you address their problems by applying your unique skills and knowledge to what you sell them.

For things like résumés and job applications, most evaluators have a utilitarian outlook. Like buying a product to fill a need, they’re looking for people who can solve a problem or add value.

P&G’s statement of purpose, at the time, read as follows: “We will provide products and services of superior quality and value that improve the lives of the world’s consumers. As a result, consumers will reward us with leadership sales, profit and value creation, allowing our people, our shareholders, and the communities in which we live and work to prosper.

He was searching for a way to meld them together. He emerged from the fog clear in his mind to define the core purpose of the company in terms of ideals he learned studying Plato and other philosophers. He rejected conventional business school dogma that the purpose of a company is to maximize shareholder wealth, replacing it with the purpose to provide a place for people to flourish and to enhance the community. To be clear, the company would also seek to grow profits and generate robust cash flow, but mainly as a necessary means to fuel the core purpose.