November 30, 2020 7 min read
This article has been translated from our Spanish edition using AI technologies. Errors can occur due to this process.
The opinions expressed by the entrepreneur’s contributors are their own.
- What do we do to be what we want to be?
- What do we want to be
- What is so important to us that we won’t give it up?
The opposite of uncertainty is certainty. One way to achieve this is to stay true to the pillars that define who we essentially are, where we are going, and where we want to go. These dimensions apply to personal and professional human development as well as to companies and organizations of all kinds.
In dizzying times and with constant change, remembering our mission, vision and values becomes a strategic measure in order not to get lost. In order for us to develop further as individuals and teams, these key aspects must be clarified, which strengthen commitment, responsibility and willingness to work better together.
In those cases where they are not clear, the course is unpredictable and often ends in the worst possible way: making a company disappear, and even when a person feels they have lost the meaning of life.
Because they are important?
The mission to uphold vision and values and share them with the entire organization and even see if they match up personally – which will lead to greater participation – is the challenge of innovative, creative and challenging organizations.
Image: Joshua Earle via Unsplash
These three pillars are transversal to everything we are, what we feel and what we do. Even if you are not aware of them, they are revealed and lived daily as they are part of corporate culture, habits and conscious and unconscious rituals.
I have helped improve many companies that have not seen major deviations in their company’s performance, and in a short space of time we came to the conclusion that they had deviated from their mission, vision and values.
Techniques for defining mission, vision and values
Here the topic focuses on the business and organizational world. You can repeat these guidelines in your personal and professional life.
There are companies that do not know exactly what their main activity is, that is, what needs they meet in the market and why they want to be successful in their segment. Driven by impulses – even if they have to write the texts for their website, for example – they remember the mission, vision and values and explain these aspects in a simple way, without any flight or motivation; Lack of inspiration and challenges that limit their development.
In other cases, they hire an outsider to define it and this is a mistake as no one can define these pillars better than the people who are part of the company. Every day we read very beautiful texts that are attractively decorated, although they lack nourishment and reality.
The contrast is much greater when you walk into a company and see the Mission, Vision and Values poster in color … and in many cases it all crumbles if you stand in line for a long time or who you are wanted to see that your interview was not scheduled or the processing of a payment was out of place and no one takes responsibility or no one responds to the complaints in the email activated for this purpose … Does that sound familiar to you?
Let’s look at some definitions to achieve a mission statement and vision with the appropriate focus based on your business strengths and differences:
With the help of the expert Alejandra Brandolini and her team from AB Comunicaciones, with whom we wrote the book “How to deal with internal communications”, published with the Clarín de Argentina newspaper, I invite you to review these concepts:
- An aviation organization does not operate aircraft, it transports people.
- A company that produces cosmetics does not sell blends of vitamins for the skin, but rather beauty, youth and prestige.
This means that what the company does and what it says marks the distance that needs to be reached in communication.
In terms of vision, this means conveying a seemingly impossible future state that is sufficiently motivating and challenging for the members of the company and that gives meaning and direction to its existence.
Image: Austin Distel via Unsplash
How to define your mission: Answer the question “What do we do to be what we want to be?”
This is why the company exists and what it wants to do to be useful to its audiences (e.g., customers, employees, competitors, and the community). In practice, it guides employees and partners across the focus of the business and is the “glue” that holds the organization together.
To define your vision: “What do we want to be?”
It has to be reflected in such a way that this mental image can be visualized; Start with a realistic goal, while not easy to achieve, and define the north that you are pointing to. In return, it invites you to transform and communicate what you want to become.
To find your values ”What is so important to us that we won’t give it up?”
In other words, it is an irreplaceable force that defines the way we do business, provide services, hire people, and carry out all of our activities from start to finish. Values are closely related to behaviors that define the way we act. In value-based leadership, they are basic principles that must be followed and fulfilled by all those involved without exception. Their weight is worth in concrete actions, that is, they are ratified by being exercised daily and not “twisted” or modified according to the situation.
Image: Alex Kotliarskyi via Unsplash
Some values can be: to do things with excellence all the time; exceed customer expectations; practice constant innovation; continuous improvement; Respect, equality, justice, diversity; Turn mistakes into learning; ethical behavior in the service of the company.
The Mission, Vision and Values are not just empty words to fill a room, but form the DNA of the business, and you could say if every person has them “tattooed” on their mind, there, right there, you will be on be the right way.
And you, have you defined your mission, vision and personal values in your company?
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