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I remember sitting in a planning session with the CEO of a company along with his leadership team. The CEOs vision was to grow revenue by X%. My question to him was, “How do you come up with a compelling vision that will inspire and motivate people toward this goal?” Unfortunately, the CEO didn’t have any idea.
There is nothing wrong with having a growth objective. In fact, every healthy organization should have one. The issue is translating that objective into an inspiring vision that team members can rally around. What does the growth mean to hiring new employees, providing growth opportunities for team members, enhancing the customer experience, and other crucial decisions?
We’ve been taking several blog posts to discuss the Five Practices that Drive Leadership Performance. In the last post we discussed how to Lead by Modeling the Way. In this post, we will discuss Practice 2 – Inspire a Shared Vision.
These ideas are taken from the Leadership Practices Inventory and A Coach’s Guide to Developing Exemplary Leaders by James Kouzes and Barry Posner.
Practice 2: Inspire a Shared Vision
Commitment 1 – Envision the future by imagining exciting and ennobling possibilities. Leaders are visionaries. In their mind they can see the future. They know where the business is headed, but sometimes they get stuck. Sometimes they get so bogged down in the day-to-day that they don’t take time to reflect on the future. At other times, they don’t see the importance of sharing the vision with their leadership team.
Leaders need to connect with their passion and find a common purpose that people can rally around and is meaningful for the organization.
Commitment 2 – Enlist others in a common vision by appealing to shared aspirations. Leaders need to find ways to express the vision and how it relates to team members so they feel like they are part of the process. They need to know how the vision relates to them and their contribution.
Here are some practical ways that a leader can inspire a shared vision.
- Show how the vision will influence how the work gets done. Engage team members in the process of what the implications are to the business. How will it influence customers and change or enhance your competitive advantage?
- Appeal to others to share the dream. Engage your leadership team in thinking about the strategic implications and how it impacts what they do on a daily basis. It is important to enlist them in the process so that they take ownership and engage.
- Show how their long-term interests can be realized. Think about what’s in it for them and appeal to them by using personal stories and examples. Paint a word picture of the path they can take and how you envision leading the organization from where it presently is to where you want it to be. Connecting dots for your people is a crucial step.
Everyone has a desire to work for an organization that has a higher meaning and purpose for the work with which they are engaged.
Share Your Thoughts: What is the higher purpose in your organization?
