Getting Back to Basics: Rewrite Your Mission Statement

I know, I know we all cringe at the thought of sitting through painfully long sessions wordsmithing our Mission, Vision and Values (M,V,V), but because they are the main pillars of our businesses, if resetting is your goal, it is important to first dig into the M, V, V to make sure they’re still relevant. You’re probably thinking of course they’re still relevant; we are the same business we were in 2019′ (pre-pandemic), which is probably true for most people, but as I talked about in my last blog post here, the business landscape looks much different than it did in 2019. At the health center, I was the CEO of during the pandemic, we embarked on a new strategic plan in February of 2020 and finished it in April 2020. Even in that short amount of time, with the pandemic in the very first stages, we knew our Mission was missing something. We kept saying we wanted to make healthcare accessible to everyone (even before the pandemic hit), and yet, the word “accessible” was nowhere to be found in our Mission Statement. Our Mission went from “To provide quality, comprehensive, patient-centered care with comfort” to “To provide quality, patient-centered, accessible healthcare with comfort.” See how just making a few small changes really aligned the Mission statement with what was important to us and the people we served?

Is a Mission Statement Still Important for a Business?

The short answer is YES. Most of us have had the experience of working for a company that has a Mission statement on the wall, but that is it. No one can recite the Mission statement, and it certainly isn’t engrained in the culture of the business; leading to employees not working from the same playbook. The overarching goal of the business should be stated in the Mission statement, and if it is written well, everyone working for the business should know it and work to achieve it every day.

No matter what size business you’re leading (solopreneur to large business), a Mission statement is going to help you create a story about the business that is easy to tell and more importantly, easy to live. An example of this is LinkedIn’s Mission:

“To connect the World’s professionals to make them more productive and successful.”

You can see how that Mission statement gives the employees and customers of LinkedIn a clear picture of what the business is trying to do every day. Another good example is Amazon:

“To be Earth’s most customer-centric company, where customers can find and discover anything they might want to buy online, and endeavors to offer its customers the lowest possible prices.”

It is easy to see that Amazon’s emphasis is on customer service and low prices. And, by adding “Earth’s” in there, they are clearly stating they want to be one of the largest global markets…and, they are.

How To Update Your Mission Statement

Have you ever worked for a business that has a Mission statement so full of jargon or inside language that you don’t even understand it? Or, one that is SO long that you can’t remember it? That is very common practice, and a good reason why taking a look at your Mission statement every year or so, is a good idea. 

Chances are you or your business have a Mission statement, already. If so, you probably only need to make sure it is still relevant to your business and continues to evolve with the industry. In addition, you want to make sure it is future-focused (what you want to do) and uses clear and concise language.

Donald Miller, author of Business Made Simple, says a Mission statement should follow this formula: What you want to do (x) + Who you want to do it for (y) Or, What you want to do (x) + Who you want to do it for (y) + Why you want to do (z). Here is an example of a good Mission statement that follows that formula.

PayPal: “To build the web’s most convenient, secure, cost-effective payment solution.”

Or

Google: “To organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful.” 

A Mission statement should also follow these guidelines:

No more than 1-2 sentences: Remember, we want people to be able to remember it easily.

Be attainable: It should be something everyone in the organization should be able to realistically work on.

Be inspirational: Although it needs to be attainable, it can also help inspire you or the company’s employees to do better. People want to work toward a goal that makes them feel good, and your Mission statement is an overarching goal.

Don’t use jargon or buzzwords: You don’t want to leave any room for misinterpretation or misunderstanding. 

A Mission statement should also do the following for your business:

· Use clear and concise language to tell you, your staff, and your customers what you do

· Help get everyone in alignment (everyone should know what they need to do every day to work toward the Mission)

· Help create a clear Vision and Values and/or Guiding Principles

Are Mission and Vision the Same?

Although they can often get confused with one another, or a company thinks they only need one or the other, a Mission statement is different from a Vision statement. A Mission statement describes the company’s purpose and the Vision describes where the company is going. We will dig more into Vision statements next week because I think it is also an important step to getting back to basics and making sure you’re still headed in the direction you need to be.

Communicate the Mission Statement Every Chance You Get

You don’t want to do the work to write or update your Mission statement and then not implement it. The goal is to make it your purpose, and in order to do that, you’ve got to communicate it to everyone. Incorporate it into everything the business does internally by making it easy to see (on the wall, on the first page of the intranet, on the first slide of every meeting, read aloud at every meeting, etc). Talk about it and make it part of goal-setting meetings. How will you and the company’s employees be working on the Mission of the company every day? Has the Mission been incorporated into the goals and objectives of the strategic plan or annual performance evaluations? This is a great way to make sure it becomes part of the company’s culture. And don’t forget to communicate it to everyone externally! Put it on the company’s website (front page), talk about it when you speak in public, and even put it on any public-facing documents such as brochures and business cards.

Updating your Mission statement is something you can do right away that will get you started on resetting the business. Don’t do it in a silo, though. If you have a team of employees, a leadership team, or even a Board of Directors, do this exercise together and get those juices flowing.