Money, Meaning, and the Space Between — LinkedIn Live #9
Elsbeth Van Lienden and Nienke van Bezooijen on why money and meaning cannot be sequenced, what happens when a scan surfaces the wrong kind of decision help, and Peter Hemels' meaning-driven organisation.
Every week, something in the field moves.
This week, it moved through a conversation with Peter Hemels — Future Proof, our final speaker for the Summit on the 17th of September. Peter is very clear about how he is shaping meaning in his new organisation, and what he was done with in the old form of purpose talk. That conversation surfaced something we then sat with on this LinkedIn Live: what meaning actually is, in the boardroom, in practice, and inside our own work.
Meaning is something we give meaning to
Elsbeth's opening: there is no single act of meaning that applies to everyone. Meaning is something we each give meaning to.
But when you drill it down, it comes to something recognisable: you are doing something that has value to someone or to something. A group of people. The earth. A community. A generation coming behind you. The sense of belonging that arises when what you are doing is for good — not as marketing language, but as felt reality.
The money-meaning entanglement
The old sequence goes: first the money, then the meaning. That sequence never arrives. The money part is never ready for adding meaning. Which is why the meaning part never comes.
The truth we came to on this Live — and which Mario has written as its own essay — is that money and meaning are always intertwined. Money meaning, meaning money. It is not a sequence. It is not even a partnership. It is an entanglement.
Money and meaning are always intertwined. Money meaning, meaning money. It is not a sequence. It is an entanglement.
Our own integrity moment
One of the more honest moments of this Live was Elsbeth naming a friction we sat with recently in our own work.
Our Full Spectrum Resolution Scan performs beautifully in M&A environments. It reads what dashboards cannot — the systemic field, the founder residues, the cultural undercurrent — and returns a higher-resolution portrait of the decision environment. Which means it can also be used to acquire a company at the best price.
Which means it can be used to help extract value from exactly the kind of founder-built, meaning-rich organisation we exist to protect. That is not a hypothetical. That is a real request we can imagine receiving.
That is the money-meaning entanglement made operational. The scan is not the problem. The direction the scan is pointed in is the equation being solved for. And that direction can no longer be neutral for us.
Research says it. Boards do not yet act on it.
There is a wall of research now — Sisodia's Firms of Endearment being the most-cited — showing that companies who treat meaning as a real, structural variable outperform their peers. Consistently. Over decades. Across sectors.
And yet the pattern Elsbeth named is exactly the pattern most boards still act on: yes, we will fix the money first, then we will add the meaning. The research is available. The proof exists. The action does not follow.
Which means something else is going on. It is not an information gap. It is a consciousness gap.
Purpose posters on the seventh floor
Nienke's reflection from her own years in higher management: the annual purpose-and-meaning sessions. The energetic away days. The enthusiastic-ish faces. And then the implementation phase, where the practice was declared too costly, too time-intensive. Everything back to zero. Next September, a new purpose exercise. Same trajectory.
This is the failure mode Mario named in the essay: purpose-washing as an addition strategy in a multiplication economy. You cannot bolt meaning onto a money-optimised organisation and expect the product to grow. You have to redesign the equation.
Without a heartbeat, you can have money meaning meaning money. It's not going to work. Then it's just a paper thing.
You have to live it
Nienke's kern-line: you have to live it.
Meaning is not something you decide to add on a Tuesday morning. It is something that gradually integrates into every decision, every hire, every trade-off, every board conversation. It comes from a different level of awareness — and from that level, different actions naturally follow.
You grow into it. That is Nienke's exact phrase, twice in the conversation. Not implementation. Growth.
Where the news is not looking
Nienke closes with a reframe worth pausing on.
The news, as it is currently constructed, illuminates the old paradigm — the collapse of institutions, the crisis of the old economic model, the unravelling. That gets called news. But it is not new. It is old with the light of new on it.
Meanwhile, the organisations quietly building what comes next — meaning-driven, coherence-based, thriving — barely register. Peter Hemels' organisation receives hundreds of applications per month from highly qualified people who want to work there. That story does not make the news.
Nienke's invitation: give air and voice to what is actually emerging. The old is crumbling. The new is here. Look at where it is.
The news illuminates the old paradigm and calls it new. It is not new. It is old with the light of new on it.
Continue the conversation
Frequently Asked
What is the money-meaning entanglement?+
The recognition that money and meaning are not two variables to solve for in sequence, but a single equation that must be solved for continuously. Mario names this Money × Meaning = Legacy. This LinkedIn Live is the founders in conversation about what that entanglement looks like in boardroom practice — including inside our own work.
What did Elsbeth mean by the Full Spectrum Resolution Scan integrity moment?+
The Scan reads the systemic field beneath M&A and other high-stake decision environments. That reading can be used to protect a founder-built, meaning-rich organisation — or to acquire it at the best possible price. That directional question is no longer neutral for us. The tool is not the issue. The equation it is pointed at is.
Who is Peter Hemels and why does he matter for the Summit?+
Peter Hemels of Future Proof is the final confirmed speaker for the Indigo Elephant Summit on 17 September. He has already made meaning operational in his organisation — to the degree that hundreds of highly qualified people apply per month to work there. He represents what most boards are still describing as aspirational.
Why does research on purpose-driven companies not change boardroom behaviour?+
Because it is not an information gap. Sisodia's research and its replications have been publicly available for over fifteen years. The gap is a consciousness gap — the boards that would need to act differently are still operating from the level of awareness that produced the current situation. Different actions require a different level, not more data.
What does 'you have to live it' actually mean in leadership practice?+
Meaning does not integrate into an organisation through a policy, a workshop, or a purpose statement on the seventh floor. It integrates through the leader's own coherence — what they attend to, what they reward, what they refuse, how they show up in the difficult conversations. The organisation reflects the coherent field its leaders build. You grow into it, gradually, not decide it in a meeting.
How do I engage with what emerges from this conversation?+
Three doors. The Summit on 17 September to hear leaders who have already made this operational. Mario's essay to understand the equation. The Organisational Architecture Assessment to see where your own organisation currently sits and what the most intelligent next move is from where you are.
LinkedIn Live returns next Thursday. Elsbeth with Mario. See you at the next one.
Imagine your business becomes a legacy for humanity.
