Seeing Your Vision

How do you want your world to look?

When you say your business is successful…what do you mean?

If everybody does what they’re supposed to do, what have they done?

The answers to these help you find your Vision. For many large companies and government agencies, “Vision Statements” are nothing more than something to print on a poster and hang everywhere, or stick on a website so your clients think you “get them.” But if it’s just a slogan, or if it’s designed to fit on a coffee mug in a pleasing font, then it isn’t going to help you at all. On the other hand, if you really put some thought into it, it’ll help you drive your business toward success, and it will offer some focus to all those wild-eyed dreamers, and squinty-eyed accountants, working for you.

If you're going to do some planning -- and you should - - you need to have some idea where you want to go. You really need to know where this business should be heading before you start worrying about budgeting, personnel, where to buy the coffee, key things like that. And as you're trying to lead your employees, you should be able to communicate your Vision to them to give them a target to shoot for. As for you, your leadership style and the techniques you use should be based on what it is you're trying to accomplish. So don't just pencil-whip it. Your Vision Statement should be the result of some real effort.

A good Vision Statement should be descriptive, using lots of nouns and not a whole lot of verbs. It’s not so much what you want to do -– that comes later -– it’s what you want to be, what you want to create, what you want your clients or customers to do or have or get. This should be the first step in any serious planning you do because it allows you to define success and puts a goal out there around which everything you do should revolve. If you don’t know where you’re going, how will you decide how to get there? For that matter, how will you ever know you’ve arrived?

It really shouldn't be the result of just one person's thinking. I mean, if you're the creator of a new firm, you probably have a pretty good idea where you want it go. But as you grow, you'll want to include others in that discussion and decision. Why? Because the discussions you have about your Vision will help you know if you've got a collection of like-minded team members or if you have 20 people going in 20 different directions (hint: that's not so good)

You need to make your Vision Statement realistic, but remember that “realistic” and “likely” are different words. It’s like the difference between “possible” and “probable” – the former is adventurous, the latter is safe. Realism depends on the time frame of your planning…if you’re only looking a year down the road you’re likely to be stuck with the resources you have, but if you look five years away, a lot more options (and challenges) occur.

When I wrote my doctoral dissertation I discussed how government agencies change (or not) when the world around them changes. One of the things I emphasized was the need for a good Vision that was communicated to, and accepted by, the members of the organization. One of my advisors said she thought government agencies spent too much time writing Vision Statements and then ignoring them, and she's probably right. But she was wrong when she said they were unimportant...if done right, they're one of the most important tools to help you lead your business.

Consider some of these:

“Places we’d be proud to have our children work for.” (Trium)

“A free and democratic Iraq.”

“We focus on our clients’ outer beauty so they can focus on their inner beauty.” (Hair by Mulan)

“Maximum shareholder value.”

These don’t tell you how they’re going to get there or where the money’s coming from to get there, but they DO tell where “there” is. With that in mind you’re in a better position to recruit the right people, obtain the right resources, and develop the best courses of action. It will also let you figure out if you’re biting off more than you can chew.

And if it fits on a coffee cup…that’s cool too.