Setting a vision for a team is important because it gives the team a reason to work and a goal to work towards it also guides them in their business decisions. Doing tasks with a goal in mind and doing them without yields very different results.
Picture this: if you ask a man to dig a 10 meter deep pit without telling him a reason, he may be enthusiastic while digging the first meter, as he hits the second meter mark, he may be wondering why is he working so hard to dig this pit, by the time he reaches the third meter, as he gets physically exhausted, he may give up altogether.
Now imagine if you told the man that the pit he is digging is going to hit an underground stream that is going to save 1,000 villagers who are dying of thirst due to a drought. The same man, with the same shovel, digging the same pit will dig it in a very different manner. Even if he gets exhausted, he will try and find someone to replace him since he knows how urgent and important the task is.
A good vision statement will inspire the team to greatness. It describes the desired future state of the team and will give them a direction to focus their daily efforts and decisions to help the company, organisation or department achieve its goal.
Here are some well written vision statements of some organisations:
“There will be a personal computer on every desk running Microsoft software.” - Bill Gates for Microsoft.
“Put a man on the moon by the end of the decade.” – John F Kennedy for NASA in 1960.
“For companies of all sizes to become best-run businesses.” – SAP.
“To make all gatherings fun, purposeful and effective.” – Anergy Fun Engineers Limited
A team without vision is like a group of people walking while they are blindfolded. Yes, they may hit into something good along the way, but there is also the more probable chance that they’ll bump into something and hurt themselves.
Mission Statement
Mission statements usually tell people “what we do” and “our motivation”. A good mission statement will describe our business to the people who are reading it, what we are trying to achieve and also share key values that an organisation believes in.
Using our mission statement as an example:
“To be the preffered partner in Asia for team building, training, meetings and events through innovative solutions.” – Anergy Fun Engineers Limited
We can see that “our business” is listed there clearly; we do “team building, training, meetings and events”.
Our motivation is that we want to be the “preferred partner in Asia” for such engagements.
Our competitive advantage is “innovative solutions”.
Core Values
Values are beliefs that will help guide behaviour of the team members. Often, our clients will give a definition of their values beside their value listings to reduce the chances of them being misunderstood. We will recommend a maximum of 7 core values so that it is easy to remember them. You can have a list of all encompassing values but if none of your team members can remember them, they will not be able to apply them at all.
Below is a list of common values that have a positive effect. Depending on the nature of your business some of these common values may or may not be applicable:
Positivity
Integrity
Initiative
Honesty
Respect
Care
Curiosity
Trust
Passion
Responsibility
Focus
Patience
Perserverence
Some of our clients enlist the help of their key appointment holders in creating their Vision, Mission and Value statements. If you need our experienced facilitators to help you chair the meeting, please drop us an email.
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