MightyRecruiterYour Guide to Aligning Company Mission With Vision
One of the keys to having a successful business is to create a working environment in which aligning company mission with vision happens on a regular basis. Studies have shown that when employees’ goals and values overlap with those of the company, they feel more confident in their jobs and better about their personal lives. It should be your goal as the head of the business to make your workers feel as though they are connected to one another in striving toward a common purpose. If you can do this, they are much more likely to stick around longer, which makes for a much more effective business venture for everyone.
Clearly Communicate Values
Take some time to determine the larger purpose behind the goods and services your company produces. Obviously, if you are the owner of a restaurant, saying that your greatest intention is to simply prepare food that people like to eat is going to ring somewhat hollow and contrived in the minds of your employees. Think deeper about what it takes for the business to be successful with customers and distribute those things for all to see. Continuing with the restaurant analogy, if your aspiration is instead to provide families and friends with a place where they can come together and enjoy one another’s company in addition to enjoying a well-made meal, you then have something employees can get behind. Don’t just be verbal when making efforts in aligning company mission with vision. Include these values in employee manuals and make sure customers know through brochures and from your website.
Building a Sense of Loyalty
Aligning company mission with vision can really only come about when you have employees who stick around long enough to help one another bring the vision to fruition. Minimizing turnover is critical. To that end, it is imperative that you put systems in place and do a few things yourself to foster a sense of loyalty on the part of the employees toward the business and toward each other. There are several ways in which you can help this process along:
-Stay in constant communication with your workers so you are able to quickly address any concerns or suggestions they might have.
-Clearly articulate your high expectations. When people have explicit goals to strive toward, they are much more motivated to meet and even surpass the challenge placed before them.
-Provide training whenever a new initiative or piece of technology is introduced into the workplace. Employees will appreciate your attention and time investment in the success of the business, and therefore be motivated to reciprocate the gesture.
-Give employees a matching 401k. Playing a positive role in their financial futures is likely to make them want to do the same for you.
-Provide opportunities for advancement and offer career counseling. If you present your people with a clear path, the prospect of following it to bigger and better things by sticking around becomes more enticing.
-Be positive whenever possible. Let them know when they have done particularly good work and make helpful suggestions for improvement. If all you do is tell people what is wrong, they will have little incentive to assist in aligning company mission with vision.
-Be understanding and receptive to family interaction. This is another example of going the extra mile. The creation of an emotional connection is one of the strongest methods of inspiring loyalty.
-Give employees opportunities to help shape the mission. Ask for their opinions on some of your ideas and see if they have any ideas of their own. Show that you value their input.
Set the Right Goals
Just the act of having a coherent set of objectives, while effective in the short term, can quickly fizzle if the objectives don’t require much in the way of initiative or innovation. The goals you set for the business should be more ambitious than to simply hit some numbers. Additionally, think of ways to articulate these statements so that everyone involved in the business has an important role to play. This encourages collaboration among employees rather than the subtle sense of competition that so often proves to be divisive and toxic, particularly in sales environments.
While you implement these new practices for aligning company mission with vision, remember that at their core, they all come down to well-articulated communication between all people in the business. If you are looking for ways in which you can further improve other aspects of your company, Mighty Recruiter is your primary source of information.