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“A leader’s role is to raise people’s aspirations for what they can become and to release their energies so they will try to get there.”
David Gergen
WHY Group exists to help people and organizations achieve. And it all begins with a purpose—their mission, their reason for being. In the performance of our services, we immerse ourselves into the lives of the enterprises we serve as if they were our own. We come alongside the leadership to bring experience, resources, and expertise that help to both define and make essential strategies work.
Of the nine arrows WHY Group carries in its quiver of services, three of them address the foundation for the organization’s existence. A mission explains its reason for being, its vision paints its picture of success, and the values it practices personify its character. Together they answer the questions of Why, What, & How. Clarity here is what drives setting key Objectives, the Strategies to achieve them, and behaviors along the way as we act on tasks and interact with each other. These key three areas are summarized nicely in Mission, Vision and Values.
Mission
Peter Drucker, the well-known and insightful business consultant, author, and educator, often proclaimed. “Anchoring an organization on the mission it pursues is the most unifying step leadership can take in building an effective organization.”
Mission is Purpose clearly defined—the reason for being—this establishes the “true north” toward which an organization’s strategies and the actions of its people should be aligned.
Vision
Vision is the picture of success. Common purpose and shared values do not ensure that individuals envision success the same. Capturing key elements of how we see the future is critical. Clarity of Vision makes for higher quality decisions when we all agree on the anticipated result.
Values
Every organization has a personality. It is most recognizable in the values practiced by the people. They are the underpinning of what gets labeled as “culture.” But too often those values go unstated and unexplained. Clarity of Values does more than just give ethical boundaries and encourage best practices. Beyond right and wrong, they give guidance to people on “how should I handle this situation?”
A strong organizational foundation is laid when these three establish clarity of purpose, a shared picture of success, and identifying inviolable values that define its character.
Strategies
The output with clarity of Mission, Vision and Values is better Strategy. Strategies define key objectives expressed in the simplest terms. They form the backbone for the organizational design to execute them, and they identify the resources required to support the effort. Whether that means creating a Strategic Vision or helping with all sorts of methods/patterns for a full blown Strategic Plan, WHY Group’s models for Strategic Planning leverages the big 3 of Mission, Vision & Values.