![Are We Doing the Right Things? [Part 1: Creating an Ideal Vision]](https://b3462738.smushcdn.com/3462738/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/Untitled-1-12-e1732183532178.png?lossy=0&strip=1&webp=1)
Are We Doing the Right Things? [Part 1: Creating an Ideal Vision]
People and organizations are “doers” by nature. We want to build something, provide some service, and support operations. Too often, we “take the bull by the horns” and start solving problems because we believe we know what needs to be done — like implementing Oracle or PeopleSoft. Sometimes we get lucky and…it works! Many times, of course, it does not work.
In our quest to be a “mover and shaker,” we spend a lot of time and money on initiatives that go nowhere, or worse yet, have to be redone. We take the bull by the horns only to find it is taking us to the slaughterhouse! Enter strategic planning…a substitute for having to rely on good luck!
Fundamentally, a great strategy assures that the bull we grab by the horns takes us to greener pastures. It does this by clearly painting a vision of the future. Ideally, this does not even involve the organization in question. It is an ideal client state that the organization intends to help clients achieve.
Example: a transportation company might have a vision of a world where everyone enjoys going anywhere they want to go without risk of injury or harm to themselves, others or the environment by 2050. Most visions are a bit more detailed than this, but the critical components of a good vision are here. It describes an end state, not actions that will be taken. It unifies
understanding about what could or should be. It provides sufficient detail to guide the organization in its decisions as is continues to build out its strategy. Another example, investing in inexpensive, but poorly designed brakes would not align well with such a vision, nor would initiatives that provide fast trains burning high-sulfur coal. Initiatives that support a magnetic levitation train or a fuel cell powered car, on the other hand, might align quite nicely with this vision. Kaufman, in 1991, referred to visions of this nature as Ideal Visions.
Ideal Visions are a significant departure from common organizational visions because an Ideal Vision no longer assumes that the client of the strategy is the organization; rather, it implies an acceptance that the organization exists to the extent that it provides a value to someone else—clients in the short-term and society in the greater scheme. The organizational goals and objectives are defined within the guiding context of this Ideal Vision. This may seem obvious, perhaps even pedantic; however, there are many cases where shortsightedness or lack of alignment with societal benefit brings prominent companies with very smart “movers and shakers” to ruin.
A frequent error is to define success in terms of revenue and profitability in spite of a contribution to a greater societal value. Companies like Arthur Anderson and Enron come to mind as high profile examples. Their undoing came from decisions that were made based on pursuing goals that had nothing to do with societal value. I’ve seen well-intentioned companies adopt a vision of providing cheap goods that you can rely on, suffer from poor sales because they release products that few clients want, then wonder why they have lost money five out of five years in a row.
When we adopt an Ideal Vision for our organization, our mission objective must define the results our organization must achieve to enable our vision to become a reality. In my next post, I will discuss creating a mission objective and how a mission objective differs from a mission statement. In the meantime, if you want some help building a strategy and roadmap for service delivery or alignment with world-class efficiency and effectiveness, or even if you just would like to discover the “right things” for your organization, drop me a line.
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MIPRO Consulting is a nationally-recognized consulting firm specializing in PeopleSoft Enterprise (particularly Enterprise Asset Management) and Business Intelligence. You’re reading MIPRO Unfiltered, its blog. If you’d like to contact MIPRO, email is a great place to start, or you can easily jump over to its main website. If you’d like to see what MIPRO offers via Twitter or Facebook, we’d love to have you.
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