What are you passionate about?

Visiting Panera Bread recently, I noticed employees’ name tags now include the question, “What’s Your Passion?” and the employee’s personal answer.

Love the question, but I’m not sure about this application. It forces an employee to disclose what might be very personal information or fudge, sharing something more generic and not really a passion at all. For instance, the person taking my order, listed “food” as her passion. From the looks of her, that was no surprise. Yet the answer had to be so short and potentially bland to fit on her name tag it really wasn’t the conversation starter I am sure the person who came up with the idea expected it to be.

Here’s a great application of the question though: Answer it for yourself, identifying your own passions. Then make sure you’re:

• Incorporating your passions into other areas of your life to enhance creativity.
• Figuring out how to share the creative energy of your passions with others.
• Exploring new passions to replace or augment ones that may be fading.

Mike Brown is an award-winning marketer and strategist with extensive experience in research, strategy, branding, and sponsorship marketing. He’s a frequent keynote presenter on innovation and authors Brainzooming!