by William “Bill” Brashers, Ph. D., Featured Contributor
[su_dropcap style=”flat”]T[/su_dropcap]HE BUSINESS COMMUNITY spends considerable energy on Mission and Vision statements. Why? Lists of procedures, rules, policies and instructions cannot comprehensively define behavior. You know this because we’ve all from given what we thought were complete instructions, only to return later and find that the resulting outcome looked nothing at all like what we thought we were explaining. “How in the world did you get THAT out of my instructions?” we ask.
The Mission and Vision provide context for judgment-based improvisation when the rules aren‘t clear or the instructions are not available. Mission statements can be great for reminding busy people what the core of our business is, and what’s the “knitting” that we’re “sticking to.” As we all learned in elementary school, context clarifies meaning.
In my experience, vision statements wind up being vague mission statements with some “value talk” thrown in. Much too often, a framed, wall-mounted “Vision Statement” relieves everyone in the organization from ever looking very far ahead in time. “We have our Vision Statement… that document is our vision, and we never have to vision anymore.” Remember, vision isn’t something you have, it’s something you do… and do often. It’s hard to create a vision statement that does more than inoculate people against actually visioning.
There are exceptions. A major pharmaceutical company had a wonderful vision statement. At the time, they were the world’s leading drug maker. Knowing that it’s easier to become number one than to stay number one, they coined the phrase, “Beyond #1.” What’s beyond number one? Two? Not what they meant… Okay, let’s go the other direction… zero. Nope. What then? Whatever it means to you in your imagination. Maybe it’s setting a new number one. Maybe it reminds me to get over myself and focus on others’ needs – Beyond #1 (myself). Every person who considers the phrase can picture an improving future in diverse ways. It’s a Vision Primer. We can discuss our vision flashes and synchronize more effectively, since we have a context. All in all, the more we talk about our future, the more effective guide we’ll have when we need to improvise.
