In the business world, Mission and Vision statements are often surrounded by confusion and tend to offer very little common ground as to what their meanings truly represent to an organization. Whether it’s because they’re too narrow/broad in scope or simply because their actualization is typically very difficult, they are often times never truly realized. Whether one wishes to believe it or not, their impact on an organization can be rather profound.
Dr. Michael E. Raynor’s article entitled “That Vision Thing: Do We Need It?” attempts to provide a framework upon which to build meaningful mission and vision statements. He attempts to explain and define the terms ‘mission’ and ‘vision’ by placing them in the context of market forces, organizational core competencies, strategies, and goals. He supports his framework through the analysis of several mission and vision statements and takes the reader through an example of how his framework can be successfully utilized by an organization.
He provides the following definitions through which he constructs the framework for building mission and vision statements:
• Values: Principles or concepts of intrinsic worth with which to align one's actions as an end in itself.
• Core competencies: A limited number of skills or technologies which, taken together, serve to differentiate a company from others in the marketplace in such a way as to provide competitive advantage.
• Market forces: Those facts about the environment within which an organization functions or competes which, taken together, indicate a probable future state of affairs of relevance to an organization.
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