Vision is Useless, Unless …
Your vision is tied to outputs. Here's how.
Your vision is literally what you see. Your vision for your company is what you see that's possible. What your company can do or become that it hasn't yet. How your company can impact a future world.
That's wonderful. Here's how to make it useful. Because it's about the future, achieving your vision is a journey from here and now to there and then. You can use that vision to inspire people to follow you on that journey. That's the definition of leadership - people are following you.
A Vision Must Become Strategy
A dream is a vision. But as they say, you have to wake up and get to work for that dream to become reality. The vision is useless unless it informs strategy. What does that mean? The best definition of strategy I know comes from Roger Martin. In this 10 minute video he explains that strategy requires you to answer three questions.
Where will we play? In other words, what markets will we serve. And by definition, which ones won't we serve. Be specific. Will we serve a certain geography? (Most SMBs do.) Will we serve the price conscious people in that market or the ones who love to spend on high priced goods and services? (Those are often mutually exclusive.)
How will we win? How will we be better at serving those customers than our competition? What capabilities and systems do we need to do this?
What must be true for our strategy to succeed? What is the consistent logic that needs to be true for this to work? True about ourselves, our competition and our customers. What data will we collect to see if this is true so we can tweak as the data comes in and our understanding of reality improves.
This is simple but not easy. You should be able to answer those questions in a single page. That's even harder - but it forces you to know your stuff.
Strategy Must Become Plans
But strategy is like an itinerary for your vacation. Now you need a plan. A plan requires
Definition of success - this is your strategy broken down in detail.
Measurable milestones - this ties your accomplishments to dates and metrics so you know if you're on track.
Commitment of resources - this assures you have what you need to achieve your plan.
Plans Must be Measured by Outputs
Finally each person in your organization must know what outputs they need to produce daily or weekly to achieve the milestones, to fulfill the strategy, to ultimately accomplish the vision. That's what I call Output Thinking. I case you haven’t heard 😁 I wrote a book about it.
Want some help?
If you'd like some help figuring out where you are on this process from vision to outputs, and what to do next, I'll have some time in the next few weeks to offer free coaching calls. Book one HERE.
Or if you'll be at Main Street Summit in October, let's set up a time to meet. Email me.