The fallacy of mission, vision and values
The fallacy of mission, vision and values
How to avoid fluffy statements and embrace practical answers that will help your organization make better strategic decisions.
Greetings from Vancouver! 👋
The world of corporate strategy is haunted by the trifecta of mission, vision and values. Almost every organization has them but are they actually helpful? My research has shown that the answer in most situations is no. They are too vague and imprecise to help leaders with regular decision-making.
However, that doesn’t mean we can’t change them to be better suited for a 21st century organization and strategy. I’ll use the analogy of a car to explain how these three elements can help you navigate through fog and heavy weather, and help you reach your destination safely.
Let’s jump right in!
Mission
The first element in our analogy is the mission, which is the destination of the car. This is the north star you’re chasing and that you may never catch. Missions provide organizations with a reason for existing, a reason for operating and a reason for others to care. You will often come across missions in the form of mission statements but don’t confuse them. Figuring out the former is incredibly useful but the latter can act like a black hole, sucking all your energy.
Before we go into the three elements of a good mission, here are three examples from some of the biggest organizations in the world:
1. Tesla = To accelerate the world's transition to sustainable energy
2. SpaceX = To revolutionize space technology, with the ultimate goal of enabling people to live on other planets.
3. Starbucks = With every cup, with every conversation, with every community - we nurture the limitless possibilities of human connection.
You—as an organization—could be doing anything but you chose a specific industry, product, service, approach and so forth. Mission is the rationale for the choice you made.
A good mission has three elements: it helps others, it is exciting and it is simple to understand.
An organization has to help others for the simple reason that customers have choices. They don’t have to buy your products or services so you have to give them a reason to engage with you. There’s exceptions to this, think of tax agencies or organizations that operate monopolies, but the general rule applies. Helping others doesn’t mean doing things for free, it just means providing something of value to the right people.
A good mission is also exciting. Look at Tesla and SpaceX. They have bold, imaginary and energizing missions. The excitement level of your mission will help you attract the right kind of people to help you accomplish it. Exciting isn’t only limited to going to space or tackling climate change. Exciting could be local, small and personal.
Finally, a good mission is easy to understand and a conversation starter. The next logical question should be, how do you do that? I’m actually not sure what Starbucks means by their mission. It seems clever and complex, like it was written to be impressive. They would be better off with a simpler mission, instead of the fluffy one they currently have.
Crafting a mission is not the same as writing a mission statement. I am skeptical of the value of mission statements, especially if it takes you days or weeks to do so. As someone who enjoys the act of writing, I can tell you that collectively putting together a handful of words can be excruciating. Everyone has their own opinion and interpretation of what specific words mean, making the whole endeavor a painful, tortuous exercise in patience.
Instead, I would assign someone in your team to summarize the answers to my three elements and then allow limited feedback on it. Having a one sentence output of your mission is nice but it shouldn’t take an individual more than an hour or two to do it.
Question: What is the reason for the existence of your organization?
Vision
Vision is the direction in our car analogy. We know our destination, the mission, but we need a way of knowing if we are making progress. When I help an organization craft a strategy, we treat vision as a summary of the plan itself. If your plan is for the next two years (because who’s crafting 5-year plans anymore), then your vision is an overview of what you hope to accomplish during that time frame.
A good vision is tangible and practical. If we took Tesla’s mission, to accelerate the world's transition to sustainable energy, then a corresponding vision might state their desire to build two new lower cost vehicles, construct three new production facilities and expand their charging network across the globe. Everyone in the company will know if they hit or miss their vision.
All organizations have limited resources and they are forced to make hard choices on where to focus. Their vision is a reflection of those choices. What areas, if improved, could have the most meaningful impact on their long-term mission? There’s an element of practicality, perhaps in the form of funding, profit or legal requirements, before the organization can tackle the most audacious portions of their mission.
Just like mission statements, I am skeptical of lengthy work to craft a vision statement. Besides, in my lexicon, visions are the natural by-product of a well-designed strategy formulation session. I recently helped a non-for-profit formulate their strategy for the next two years and their vision is to dramatically increase funding, expand their team and create a cohesive brand. There’s more details in their plan but that is good enough for vision.
You’ll likely notice a theme of simplicity in my approach. All of this stuff—missions, visions and values—must have some utility during day to day decisions. I don’t get the obsession with fluffy but hard to explain approaches. Clarity should be the utmost priority when going through these exercises.
Question: What is the vision of your organization and for what timeframe?
Values
The final element in our car analogy are values, which are the passengers inside the vehicle. Mission is the destination and vision is the directions but the people inside the car will be the ones doing the driving.
Values are weird to me because of how vague they have become. I constantly come across a list of values such as: honesty, respect, innovation, integrity and family. It’s almost like they were generated by ChatGPT but this trend long predates the AI tool so we can’t pin the blame on it.
The goal of values is to telegraph to others why they should join your organization. You need the right people and values helps you weed out the wrong ones. The problem is that vague words simply don’t do that. There’s not a lot of people who are seeking to join an organization whose values are dishonesty or disrespect. At least not the kind of people you would want joining your team anyway.
Good values should be crystal clear on who you want in your team and who you don’t want. This means that values are actually exclusionary, which may be controversial in a culture that is obsessed with inclusion and DEI.
A good list of values would look like this:
Focus on outcomes, not hours, wherever you are
Respect is essential, liking is optional
Be rewarded for innovation, not stymied
Own decisions, regardless of your position
My hypothetical list of values gives us a glimpse on what this organization cares about. The first value shows that remote workers are welcome here, while those who prefer to work in-person might not be a good fit. Likewise, the fourth value attracts individuals who want to make big decisions but repels those who prefer to punt their decisions to someone else.
This organization will also have an easier time knowing if they are living out these values. Do their work policies put too much emphasis on hours i.e. being in the office? Are they trying to get their employees to become friends? Did they properly reward those who tried new ideas but failed?
If your values aren’t clear, you will end up with people who feel the same. Like mission and vision, you don’t need complex words to get your point across but you do need to make hard decisions on what matters. You might prefer in-person work to remote, leading you to choose a value that reads “The office is where work gets done.” I make no judgment on your values but I should know where you stand on critical issues such as remote work.
Question: How do your values help you attract and repel people?
Don’t let tradition or social pressure force you into pointless exercises. Treat mission, vision and values as utilitarian concepts, hired to help your organization make better decisions. No one needs another more vague mission statement, regardless of how much consultants may charge you for it.
Cheers,
Ruben
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