Managing Vision & Purpose

Managing vision and purpose requires planning strategically. Strategic planning is the formal consideration of an organization's future course. All strategic planning deals with at least one of three key questions:

• "What do we do?"
• "For whom do we do it?"
• "How do we excel?" or “How do we compete effectively?”

In many organizations, this is viewed as a process for determining where an organization is going over the next year or more -typically 3 to 5 years, although some extend their vision to 20 years. In order to determine where it is going, the organization needs to know exactly where it stands, then determines where it wants to go and how it will get there.

This process requires understanding and articulating vision, mission, and values, which can be understood as:

• Vision: Defines where the organization wants to be in the future. It reflects the optimistic view of the organization's future.
• Mission: Defines where the organization is going now, basically describing the purpose, why this organization exists.
• Values: Main values protected by the organization, reflecting the organization's culture and priorities.

Typical presenting issues that suggest Managing Vision & Purpose should be explored:

• The organization has never engaged in strategic planning
• The organization finds itself operating reactively rather than proactively, missing opportunities, reworking processes, and expending resources to correct preventable errors
• The members of the organization cannot articulate or do not experience a common understanding of the organization’s vision and purpose
• The members of the organization do not understand how their individual roles contribute to the shared vision and purpose