LCG Vision and Commentary

30 November 2008

Organisational Mission and Strategy
Part 1: Vision, Mission and Values

Organisations must establish a framework for sustainable success. This effort must be driven by the founder, senior management or the owner of the business to effect a sense of purpose that is then translated into actionable goals or objectives.

Increasingly, an understanding of the organisation’s mission is important for alignment of each person’s mission as it remains a key driver, indicative of workplace happiness and hence workforce retention.

Maintaining your workforce and saving on selection and training costs highlights in the face of economic recession the importance of a strategic approach. An organisation can then be MORE competitive through focused efforts on innovative thinking and processes but also enhanced relationships internally (team-building) and externally (business development).

Vision

A vision is a statement about what your organisation wants to become. It should resonate with all members of the organisation and help them feel proud, excited, and part of something much bigger than themselves. A vision needs to stretch the organisation’s capabilities (within reality). It gives shape and direction to the organisation’s future. Visions range in length from a couple of words to many pages. Ideally shorter vision statements are better as people will tend to remember a shorter organisational vision.

Bill Gates:
"There will be a personal computer on every desk running Microsoft software”

Mission

Mission or Purpose is a succinct description of what an organisation does. It should describe the business the organisation is in. It is a definition of "why" the organisation exists currently. Each member of an organisation should be able to verbally express this mission.

Pfizer Pharmaceutical's Mission Statement:
"We dedicate ourselves to humanity's quest for longer, healthier, happier lives through innovation in pharmaceutical, consumer and animal health products".

Pfizer in its Mission Statement clearly identifies its purpose, the business it’s in and it’s core value – innovation.

Personal Vision Statement

Each person needs a mission for his or her life. The alignment of your life mission with your organisation’s mission is one of the key factors in whether you are happy with your work and workplace. If they are non-aligned, you are likely dissatisfied with your work choice.

If you’re a manager it’s in your interest to ensure that worker personal visions are aligned with that of the organisation to enable productivity and ongoing innovation.

Values

Values are traits or qualities that are considered worthwhile. They represent an individual’s highest priorities and deeply held driving forces. Values are also known as Core Values they all refer to the same sentiment.

Value statements are grounded in values and define how people want to behave with each other in the organisation. They are statements about how the organisation will value customers, suppliers, and the internal community. Value statements describe actions which are the living enactment of the fundamental values held by most individuals within the organisation.

The values of each of the individuals in your workplace, along with their experience, upbringing and personal values coalesce together to form your ‘corporate culture’. The values of your senior leaders are especially important in the development of your culture. These leaders have a lot of power in your organisation to set the course and environment and they have selected the staff for your workplace.

If you think about your own life, your values form the cornerstones for all you do and accomplish. They define where you spend your time and whom you spend your time with, if you are truly living your values. Each of you makes choices in life according to your most important four – ten values. Why not take the time to identify what is most important to you and to your organisation.

Why is there a need to establish a Values set?

Effective organisations identify and develop a clear, concise and shared meaning of values/beliefs, priorities, and direction so that everyone understands and can contribute. Once defined, values impact every aspect of your organisation. You must support and nurture this impact or identifying values will have been a wasted exercise.

If you want the values you identify to have an impact, the following must occur:

• People demonstrate and model their values in action in their personal work behaviours, decision making, contribution and interpersonal interaction.
• Organisational values help each person establish priorities in their daily work life.
• Values guide every decision that is made once the organisation has cooperatively created the values and the value statements.
• Rewards and recognition within the organisation are structured to recognise those people whose work embodies the values the organisation embraced.
• Organisational goals are grounded in the identified values. Adoption of the values and the behaviours that result is recognised in regular performance feedback.
• People hire and promote individuals whose outlook and actions are congruent with the values of the organisation.
• Only the active participation of all members of the organisation will ensure a truly organisation-wide, values-based, shared culture.

The following are examples of values:

Time spent delineating a strategic framework to focus on your Vision, Mission and Values sets the necessary platform and organisational energy upon which to form strategic goals and action plans.

It’s the journey that matters as it’s all encompassing to align purpose and achievement!

To our health,
--- MDES
"It's not that I'm so smart, it's just that I stay with problems longer."
Albert Einstein
1879-1955, Physicist