Your Vision is fine…
You started your business with some kind of dream, some sort of plan. Maybe you imagined what it would look like in 3 years, 5 years or even 10 years out. (as an unrelated side note, 10 years is a really long time – think about all of the things that have changed in the last 10 years. In Kansas City 10 years ago, the Royals were really bad…okay maybe some things don’t change, but a lot of things do. The point is, anything is possible in 10 years).
So you had a vision for your business. How’s that working out for you? If you’re like a lot of people (myself included) you may have written some things down but odds are you’ve haven’t looked at it in quite a while, assuming you could even find it. That’s too bad – maybe it’s time to change that.
My advice would be to make the effort to dig it out and spend some time and energy to update it. It’s a difficult exercise, but there are a lot of good reasons why it’s well worth your time. Here are a few reasons why reviewing, updating and publishing/sharing your vision is important:
- Does your Vision still make sense? Odds are it probably does, but if you think about how significantly the world, you and your customers have changed in the last 2 or 3 years, it’s worth considering.
- Are you on the right path? A vision is your roadmap that lays out how your business is going to meet your needs. You could be making all kinds of movement, but is it really getting you to where you want to go?
- Is everyone else on the same page? Initially the vision is really for your benefit. The act of getting it down on paper, refining and thinking it through it are excellent ways to crystallize and cement your thoughts. However once you’ve done the hard strategic deep thinking, one of the main reasons to have (and use) your vision is to make sure your employees, partners, vendors and customers know what you’re all about and that you’re all rowing in the same direction.
- Are you congruent? Your vision is your foundation, your cornerstone (pick your own favorite building metaphor here…). It should be the basis for your brand, your communications, how you treat your employees, your customers. If it all ties together and everyone understands it, suddenly a lot of things become a lot easier. You have a company culture that people can instinctively pick up and predict how things should work.
Maybe it’s time to get excited about your business again. Dusting off that old vision might be just the ticket for remembering why you started down this path in the first place and help you re-energize and get focused.
So what about you – do you have an updated Vision? Have you shared it with the right people? Is it driving your marketing message?
Let me know, I’d be interested to hear from you.
Shawn Kinkade – Aspire Business Development
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