Is Your Vision Alive Or Has Resistance Won?
Snapshot
As a business coach, no set of questions is more important for a client than three questions that analyze what the “Vision Condition” of an organization is. They’re crucial because anything I lead my client to consider changing in the organization hinges on employee motivation. If there’s no buy-in to vision, I’m just offering the leader another set of ideas to be resisted by employees. But a revived focus on company vision gives us a “power tool” to work with.
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As a business coach, no set of questions is more important for a client than three questions that analyze what the “Vision Condition” of an organization is. They’re crucial because anything I lead my client to consider changing in the organization hinges on employee motivation. If there’s no buy-in to vision, I’m just offering the leader another set of ideas to be resisted by employees. But a revived focus on company vision gives us a “power tool” to work with.
Here are the three questions I always explore with my clients:
First, “What’s the current “Vision Condition” in the company?”
To begin, I should clarify what vision really is, in two ways:
- Vision is not a set of short term goals. It’s a futuristic idea of where a company is going and what it will achieve. Vision deals with a timeframe no shorter than two to five years.
- It’s long on big picture thinking and images, and short on the details of how to get there. The details get invented and adjusted along the way.
To analyze the "Vision Condition" of a company, you need to understand that vision is something that’s often hard to see. Vision exists in the culture of a company, in the body of the organization. As such, it’s something you more often sense or feel as you are present in the day to day operation. It’s a living thing, a state of thinking and focus among the members of the team.
There are, however, some ways in which you can readily see and hear strong vision in an organization. Let me give you just a few examples.
In a company with a strong and growing vision, you’ll see regular company meetings in which the key leader speaks to the vision of the company. The leader not only points to the vision statement on the wall, but also points out how the day to day activities of every employee there helps get the company closer to that vision. At BusinessCoach.com, we teach our clients creative ways to do this every month.
As you walk around the offices in a company with strong vision, you might also see vision reminders on posters, wall plaques; even screen savers on computers. They’ll be in every workspace, not just the boardroom. This drives home the fact that the vision can be achieved in every cubicle and at every loading dock. Every employee, in every day to day action they perform, can make a contribution
You not only see vision strength in a business, but you also hear it. You hear it in middle level managers meetings, where the first item on the agenda every week is to go over the vision, mission, and company commitments in a meaningful fashion.
Most of all, however, you’ll hear it in the language of the key leader. And I’m not just talking about the stage language he or she might use in a large meeting where they’re “supposed” to talk about vision. I’m talking about unguarded conversations all day long in which the key leader reflexively talks about the vision of the company.
You’ll hear it pop up constantly in a visionary leader’s words. The two to five year focus will come up, along with verbal images of the clients they will help, or the financial payoff everyone will earn when the vision is realized. Whatever the energizing aspects of the vision are, you’ll hear them regularly shaping the conversations of a leader who is himself in a strong “Vision Condition”. Those words will shape a company into a visionary dynamo.
Second, “How much has resistance taken over vision?”
I’ve discovered over 16 years of coaching that the new generation of employees is not culturally hardwired to hook into vision. We’re hiring today from a culture of the individual, with little concept of company loyalty or job longevity. So that means that vision resistance may walk in the door with every new hire you make. It also means that only an occasional mention of the company vision by the leader is not enough. Constant repetition of the vision message is required. If you’re not doing this, I can pretty much tell you that resistance is already strong in your organization.
Resistance can also be gauged by how well your key managers are brought into and sold on the vision conversation. If they’re not shaping their teams with vision language, resistance is moving against your future vision. Visionless managers are like an army of master sergeants who don’t know why you’re fighting the war. They’re more likely directing traffic instead of leading people.
If you hear a constant replaying of the “blame game” in the company, you’ve got a resistance problem. This comes from a leadership team blaming their employees with the words “We tell ‘em about the vision. Why don’t they get it? They just don’t care.” Maybe a few don’t, but the bigger problem is usually under-communicationg your vision. Remember, they’re not hardwired for vision. They’re hardwired to take care of themselves. So you have to over-communicate vision in every way possible. If you don’t, resistance will win.
Third, “How do you conquer resistance with new vision?”
If you’re the key leader in your organization, the answer is in the middle of your question. It’s the word you. You have to get obsessed with your vision, you have to be energized by it, you have to be committed to it, you have to be married to it, to the level that it shapes every conversation and communication you allow in your company. If you can do that, you can eventually change the energy of your enterprise.
Something this global in a leader’s practice sometimes requires an emotional event in the leader’s life. I worked with a leader recently who had led his dealership to become number one in the world in sales volume. His employees felt there was no need for a vision because they had gotten to the top.
I can remember the day when he got so aggravated at this complacency that he almost yelled “I don’t care about being number one in the world in sales anymore! If we can’t treat our customers better than anyone else in the world, the sales mean nothing!’ In that emotional moment, my client found his new vision, and the passion to go with it. Today, his company is moving into a new level, with a new culture. So can yours!
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