Almost any organisation can prove that it does things. It can prove that it hires people, that those people carry out different tasks, and that money is earned and spent. But what many organisations cannot prove is the most important thing: whether they are fulfilling their purpose or not. High-performance organisations don't just do stuff. They have an impact — ideally, the impact they exist to make. And they can prove how much impact they create.
It should be easy to work out the intended impact of any company; it's stated right there in their mission statement. (After all, that's what a mission statement is for.) But that's often not the case! How seriously do you take your organisation's mission and vision, its values and strategic direction? How seriously does your leadership team take them? And your employees? In many organisations, these things exist but are empty platitudes. They exist because they are supposed to exist, and not because they serve any useful purpose. But they should.
The world has evolved far beyond the style of leadership that expected employees to do what they were told and not question managers. People give their best when they work for a cause: something they believe in, that's bigger than themselves and more than their job description. They want a compelling mission and inspiring vision. They want to know that their work is making a difference in the world, and in the future their children will inherit.
People give their best when they work for a cause.
Vision and mission statements these days have become pedestrian and clichéd — the thin and empty products of jumping through strategic planning hoops. They've lost the ability to unite masses of people in a shared cause and have imbued more cynicism into workforces. From my experience, the main reason that visions and missions aren't measured is because they are deliberately broad for aspirational purposes, and deliberately vague so everyone can find their own meaning in them. Being broad and vague means being immeasurable.
What impact do you think the organisations with the following mission statements intend to make? Can you even tell what types of companies they are, let alone measure their achievement of these goals?
- ‘To refresh the world ... To inspire moments of optimism and happiness ... To create value and make a difference.'
- ‘To help people and businesses throughout the world realize their full potential.'
- ‘Families Making the Difference.'
The first one is The Coca-Cola Company. The second one is Microsoft. The third is PATH, a nonprofit organisation that provides foster care for children with special emotional, behavioural and medical needs. It wasn't obvious, was it? How can such statements be guiding lights to drive the focus, energy and activity of people throughout an organisation when they are this broad and vague? If a strategic direction is not measurable, it's not understandable and it's not recognisable in the world around us.
My purpose here is not to criticise any of these organisations. It might seem unfair to claim that PATH's mission is vague and immeasurable, given that they make such a worthy contribution to the world. If we take that principle to the extreme — that nonprofits don't have to prove their impact — it suggests that if you have a worthy mandate, you don't have to try hard at evidence-based thinking. If nonprofits want to attract more support, and produce the best outcomes possible, they need a clear vision and a measurable impact as much as any organisation.
The importance of clarity
Florence Chadwick was an accomplished open-water swimmer in the 1950s. A legend in her own time, the Californian was the first woman to swim the English Channel in both directions. But when Florence attempted to swim the Catalina Channel a year later, it wasn't the distance and ice-cold water and circling sharks that stopped her. With only a few hundred metres left to swim before she reached her destination of Palos Verde, she gave in. And her reason was fog. She knew that if the fog had cleared and she could see land, she'd have made it. But she couldn't see through the fog and couldn't see that she was making any progress. Only a couple of months later, she tried again. The fog was just as bad, but this time she held a vivid image of her destination firmly in her mind. And she made it. When our vision, our purpose, our direction are specific and clear, they are compelling.
This advice from James Grady, author of A Simple Statement: A Guide to Non-profit Arts Management and Leadership, is certainly true of nonprofit organisations, but I believe it's equally true for government and business as well:
The following nonprofit and government organisations' mission statements reflect how clear they are about their purpose. Can you guess the line of work they're in, or even which organisations they are?
- ‘... creating a community partnership of knowledge, skills and expertise to enrich the participation in life of people who are blind or have low vision and their families. We will ensure that the community recognises their capabilities and contributions.'
- ‘To prevent cruelty to animals by actively promoting their care and protection.'
- ‘To make Australia the most desirable destination on earth.'
- ‘To make Australian sport stronger — to get more people playing sport and to help athletes pursue their dreams.'
The first is from Vision Australia, the second from RSPCA Australia, the third from Tourism Australian, and the last from the Australian Institute of Sport. These are very clear mission statements that make the purpose of the organisation measurable, understandable and recognisable in the world around us.
And what about for-profit companies? Their mission can certainly be more than to make profit. Profit is a by-product of business that is obviously very important to shareholders, but not really important to other stakeholders without whose support the business would simply not exist (customers, the community, employees not rewarded with profit-share). Can you guess which companies (or at least which types of companies) own the following ‘beyond profit' mission statements?
- ‘To grow a profitable airline ... Where people love to fly ... And where people love to work.'
- ‘To care for the world we live in, from the products we make to the ways in which we give back to society. At [company name removed], we strive to set an example for environmental leadership and responsibility — not just in the world of beauty, but around the world.'
- ‘To be earth's most customer centric company; to build a place where people ca...
