Ideas are the bedrock of any successful company. Having a solid vision for your business’s future is crucial to success, regardless of the market segment you operate within.
When first faced with the challenge of forming a compelling vision for your company, it may seem like a difficult task. However, readers can rest easy – as we have compiled everything that you’ll need to know to create a vision and missions statement specific to your business.
What is a Company Vision Statement?
Just as a ship captain requires a clear understanding of how to operate the vessel and its eventual destination, so too must business owners understand both how they run their business and where they are heading in the future.
Without a clear and direct vision that the company leader spearheads, even the most well-founded and seemingly foolproof business models can drift off-course.
For this reason, it is always advisable to create a clear and concise vision statement that highlights the businesses aspirations, core values and founding principles.
Laying out a vision statement early on in your companies development can be a great way of ensuring that all staff-members across the board are focused on a common goal.
What goes into a good vision statement?
A good vision statement should succinctly sum-up what your company aims to achieve, in a way that is relatable to every employee.
The best vision statements are often short, to-the-point, and leave no room for misinterpretation. This way you can get all employees on the same page faster.
Vision statements should be made clear to employees from day one.
By being incorporated into the hiring process as early as possible – and then further empathised during the following onboarding and development stages of employment – you can make sure that every employee is working towards a shared goal.
The best vision statements are ones which are punchy and direct – usually no more than two sentences.
These can be developed further and expanded later, but it is always a good idea to have a short and memorable mantra that your employees will remember.
Another principle of a good vision statement is relatable to employees across every level of your company.
Below are some simple steps you can take to come up with a memorable, authentic vision statement:
■ Express your companies values – What impression do you want to leave on customers?
■ Distinguish your unique identity – Why is your company different from the others?
■ Make it relatable – It is always a good idea to add a ‘human’ touch to your vision statement.
What are the three types of business goals?
As a business, you must set attainable goals for your companies direction.
Business owners should note that there are three specific varieties of business goals to be aware of:
■ Business goals set on an individual level
■ Business goals set within different areas of the company.
■ Business goals set within specific time parameters.
Individually set goals are those which align with the companies vision statement and ultimate ideals.
The purpose of these goals is to govern the business’s business’s trajectory and propose, and they typically incorporate strategic goals, tactical goals, and operational goals.
If a company has already set their mission statement, business owners must make sure they are current, attainable and in-line with the company ethos.
They should also ensure that there are no areas of ambiguity which employees could misunderstand within these goals.
Business owners also need to be aware of the constraints within their company. These cover both industry-level constraints, project-specific constraints and time constraints.
What is the purpose of a company vision statement?
Every company begins its life as an idea or vision.
Those who have these ideas – often the company’s visionary leaders – must make sure that their idea’s very essence and ethos can be described clearly and succinctly across all sectors of business – from top company positions to the customers.
It is here at a good vision statement serves it proposes.
Writing a companies vision statement is often considered a genuinely fulfilling and rewarding task for all those involved.
This is because it forces business owners to articulate their company’s defining principles and character in a relatable and understandable way.
For companies who work within software development, a vision statement can be a great way of inspiring your team to focus on the larger overall picture – rather than get wrapped up in smaller details and lose sight of the organisation’s ultimate goal.
Ensuring all team members within your organization are working towards a shared goal can ultimately increase the chances of building the best product or service possible.
What is a mission statement?
Fundamentally, a mission statement is a short description of a businesses core ‘purpose’ and reason for being.
A good mission statement is not one which details how a company plans to make a profit, but rather why the company aims to make a profit.
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Some good statement examples of successful mission statements include:
■ Our vision is to be earth’s most customer-centric company; to build a place where people can come to find and discover anything they might want to buy online. (Amazon’s mission statement)
■ Our company mission is to organise the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful. That’s why Search makes it easy to discover a broad range of data from a wide variety of sources (Google’s mission statement)
Within just a short, concise paragraph, both these industry-leading companies can sum up their fundamental reason for being in a way that relates to both employees and customers.
What’s the purpose of mission statements?
A well-founded, honest mission statement can be an excellent way for companies to inspire and implement solutions within their business sectors.
Part of the reason that writing a mission statement can be a difficult task is that there are typically three different target audiences:
■ Employees across all levels of business.
■ The consumer or customer.
■ Any company stakeholders and partners.
A good mission statement should address all three of these audiences directly, in a way which sounds concise, natural and honest.
Another crucial purpose of a mission statement is to bring inspiration and innovation to your workplace and make existing employees motivated to work with you.
Successful mission statements also act as a motivational tool to attract new customers to your business or service or to inspire investors or external financing.
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What are the critical differences between mission and vision statements?
The primary between the two is that a vision statement tends to focus on a company’s future, whereas mission statements centre around your business’s current state.
A vision statement is often a set of attainable goals and aspirations for a company’s future development. On the other hand, a mission statement should indicate what the company does and why consumers or investors might want to buy in.
Mission and vision statements are a great way of engaging with your organisation’s employees and ultimately achieving your corporate goals.
Properly written mission statements can be a tremendous public-facing marketing and promotional tool. Many businesses place their mission statements predominantly on their homepage or bio-section of their website so that it becomes synonymous with your organization or company.
The best ways of identifying the goals and vision of a company
One of the leading cause of failure for small business is a lack of future planning.
Without a clear idea of both who your organization is, and where it is heading, even the most surefire ideas can often fail to launch.
Mind Mapping:
Mind-maps are one of the simplest and most effective tools for enterprise goal setting.
Principally, a mind-map is a visual depiction of hierarchical data from a central idea or phrase with ‘branches’ of related information spanning from the central-point.
Mind Mapping has been a go-to brainstorming method since its inception in the late ’60s.
Any organization which is goal-setting through a mindmap can follow a pre-set practice known as the S.M.A.R.T system:
■ Specific – Specific goals are those set within explicit parameters of your organization.
■ Measurable – Measurable goals are those based on quantifiable data and metrics.
■ Attainable – Goals set with a comprehension of what you can feasibly achieve.
■ Relevant – Relevant goals are those set within relevant areas and sectors of a business.
■ Time-Sensitive -These are goals set within specific time parameters.
When using mind mapping as a tool for goal setting, the central topic (the middle-point of the map) must be specific and qualified for setting goals.
For example, to simply put ‘Goals’ in the centre may be too vague. Organizations should instead try refining the centre point to be something like ‘Monthly Goals’ or ‘Personal Goals’ to contextualise it slightly.
Utilising Professional Software Services:
Suppose the pen-to-paper approach fails to ignite any creative revelations when setting a goal or vision. In that case, there are several forms of software services which can help steer your organization in the right direction.
Here at Software Development UK, we specialise in helping companies find the right partner to aid them with their business and technical challenges. If you need expert help developing your business vision, mission and goals then please consider using our FREE business connect service.
How do you align your organisation with your vision and mission?
While all of your employees may trust in your company to succeed, the truth is that these intentions have to be aligned with the company’s overall mission to have real value.
A mission statement is one of its primary strategic marketing and business development tools of any organisation. It gives team members, staff, stakeholders and customers a clear definition of your place within the market, and your reason for being there.
However, the daily runnings of an operation very rarely reflect the core values established within the mission statement – as team workers are generally motivated by personal and financial obligations and various managers’ needs across the enterprise.
This can lead to a disconnection between workers, as different motivations drive them. If this happens, it is up to the board and top-level operators to get everyone back on track.
One of the ways that they can do this is as follows:
■ Re-establish your goals – If there is disconnection within your business, it may be due to employees not having a firm enough grasp of the mission or vision statement’s principles. If this is the case, it is up to management to re-frame these principles in a way that makes sense to everyone.
■ Refine your vision – People often mistake mission statements with an idea. A mission statement is usually broad covering, whereas a vision statement is generally more refined. A Vision statement ought to be a measurable way of accomplishing the mission statement. Therefore, it is the CEO or industry leader’s responsibility to make sure their vision statement is clear and direct, so all can understand it.
■ Reinforce values – Alongside vision and mission statements, a CEO or corporate leader can also use values to align workers within an organisation. By setting the expected values for a corporation in stone, everyone is aware of their behavioural expectations and will act accordingly.
Make the Company Vision a Part of Your Company’s Processes
Companies must ensure that their vision is an integral and continuous part of the everyday work process – for all workers.
Any organisation’s success requires a clear vision for the future and a workforce committed to making the dream a reality.
While a vision statement can be a great tool to get all employees on the same page, employees must align themselves with their companies’ vision and values to be a genuinely productive workforce.
For a vision statement to be effective, it must continuously be in both staff and customers’ metal peripherals. Achieving this requires that the vision be short, direct and unambiguous so that workers from every sector of industry can be striving towards a shared objective.
One example of a successful vision statement would be Ikea’s ‘Our vision is to create a better everyday life for many people.’ Alongside their vision statement, Ikea also employs terms such as ‘together’ or ‘we’ to make them more appealing to customers.
An organisation can make its vision an integral part of its daily process by using storytelling to share with workers success stories about team members who have realised the companies vision.
By exhibiting workers who have successfully realised the companies vision, you can inspire other team members to replicate this and reward genuine progress and make all employees feel that they are part of something more than just a job.
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Tie Vision Statement in With Goals
Ideally, a companies vision statement should link with every attainable aim within the workplace. Framing the vision statement in such a way allows it to become a crucial part of the enterprise’s daily-runnings.
For a vision statement to be truly successful, it has to be relatable to every employee – and cause them to feel they are contributing towards a collectively shared objective.
All members of an organisation – from the CEO to regular workers – should be striving towards the same goal, which the vision statement sets out.
If a vision statement is too vague for staff members to aspire to, the higher-level management must update it, so it is clear and relatable.
Another advantage to tieing a vision statement with attainable goals within the workplace is that it encourages staff to take more personal responsibility and accountability.
By linking daily operational goals with your vision statement, it is possible for staff across all levels to feel that they are working towards a common goal – which, in turn, can increase their productivity.
The Best way to Help Employees Stay Focused on the Company’s Mission Vision
Some of the most successful vision statement examples are the ones which are linked directly to employee performance. For example, the online shoe retailer Zappos emphasises the value that they place on customer satisfaction within their vision statement;
“Zappos is a customer service company that just happens to sell shoes.”
This means that everyone who works with Zappos understands that they are an employer that puts customer service at the heart of everything they do.
Zappos emphasise this through positive reinforcement within the workplace. Every time an employee conducts excellent customer service, they ring a bell, and everyone congratulates them.
A common phrase often that a happy workforce is a productive workforce – and studies have shown this to be accurate, as happy staff members are found to be up to 20% more productive.
Making all team members from every section of your corporation feel included, and that – if they work hard – they can attain some reward or acknowledgement, you can keep your staff aligned to the companies mission and vision.
Why you should trust our software outsourcing in helping you align your organisation to your vision and mission goals
Even the best workers often need guidance to align with the specific mission and vision statement.
SD:UK maintains a network of certified IT vendors and we have access to experts in the domain of business coaching who can help you formulate your business vision and reach industry distinct goals.
At SD:UK, we recognise that no two companies are the same. We tailor our services around the specific requirement and obstacles within the marketplace that the enterprise operates. We work closely with you to find the right partner to help accelerate your business.
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As an example, our CTOs (Cheif Technology Officers) as a service, provides industry-specific expertise to help companies create the architectural framework for their business and help them find their ideal partners to further their mission goals.
SD:UK also helps businesses flourish, by offering bespoke advice about best industry practices and procedures for delivering a project.
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We have a consistently proven track record of helping businesses reach new heights of success by helping you fulfill all your business needs cost-effectively.
BUSINESS VISION Frequently Asked Questions
Please find below frequently asked questions around setting a business vision, mission statement and goals.
The best vision statements are the ones which stick with you and say all there is to say – without saying too much. Below are some vision and mission statement examples that are notably successful:
“Tesla’s mission is to accelerate the world’s transition to sustainable energy.“- Tesla’s mission.
“Build the best product, cause no unnecessary harm, use business to inspire and implement solutions to the environmental crisis.” – Patagonia’s vision statement.
The best way to communicate with vision within your organisation is to have a firm grasp of your vision.
Once you have a reliable picture of your vision, you should attempt to refine it to its most basic principles. At SD:UK, we specialise in helping companies develop, communicate and implement their unique vision – and can adapt the services we provide to meet the needs of any organisation.
Generally, readers can find a company’s mission statement on their bio or ‘about’ section of their website.
Many businesses also use their mission statement within their branding and corporate identities – such as the conference platform TED’s mission statement of ‘Spread ideas’ which can be found under their outputs and marketing.
Thus the phrase becomes synonymous with the brand and its ideals.
