The pathway from big picture to getting stuff done is not always simple. It requires us to operate across three levels of thinking for vision / mission, strategy and execution. Each of these is concerned with a specific question.
The following articles can accelerate your practice by providing examples how to respond to each of these questions.
1. Mission / Vision
What’s the Difference Between a Mission Statement and Vision Statement
When we start writing a mission or vision statement, we don’t always think about the differences between them. This article describes the differences between these two types of statements.
51 Mission Statement Examples from The World’s Best Companies
Want to write a mission statement but don’t know where to start? This handy reference breaks down mission and vision statement examples by industry and sector. It is an excellent place to begin for inspiration.
What Makes a Great Mission Statement
When drafting a mission statement, apply these four tests to your mission statement to make it as compelling as it can be.
7 Rules of a Vision Statement that Lasts
These simple rules are useful to consider when creating your vision statement. My favourite principle – is the vision statement “collective”, in that it’s shared by those who will act on it?
2. Creating Strategy
How To Create Great Strategy With 4 Simple Questions
All strategy starts with a question. It is the question that inspires us to search for an answer, and it is the answer that informs a path of action. The four questions summarized in this article are fundamental to any strategy.
7 Steps To Build A Digital Strategy
Although this article focuses on ‘digital strategy’ the same strategy process (from inputs to action) is relevant to any areas of enquiry. I would have used a process like this over a hundred times. It is inspired by Jo Voros’ excellent paper on strategic processes.
Use Your ‘Desired Future’ To Set Goals For The Next 6 Months
All strategy requires us to consider “what would happen if we didn’t act” and then what “scenario (or possible future) will unfold if we act.” While this article has a focus on personal goal setting, thinking about preferred/desired futures versus probable futures is important to strategy making.
3. Enabling Execution
Vision and strategy cannot fulfil their purpose without action. So when considering execution, we also need to about what constitutes high performance, how teams are best organized and the role of mindset in pursuing goals.
Cracking The Code Of Highly Effective Teams
Google’s Project Aristotle is a great reference for the conditions in which teams thrive. In this article, we look at some of the principles of this prior research and how to setup teams for success.
4 Patterns For High Performance
There is more than one route to high performance. I’ve seen many teams become disappointed when they failed at something, but often on the other side of failure is great success. In this article we take a look at some of the alternative patterns for strong performance, so that we can consider success as the result of a series of many attempts and different pathways, rather than one, single way.
The Mindset That Can Make Or Break Performance
Mindset can create and break great teams. Show me the team who has endured difficulty and still done well, rather than the team that has prospered only in favorable conditions, and we will see just how important mindset is. This article discusses the role of belief in mindset, based on a sports research study by Gary Ness and Robert Patton. And of course, there is also Carol Dweck’s work on growth mindsets to realize our full potential.
9 Prioritization Techniques For Product Managers
To execute against strategy, we have to prioritize time and resources. Prioritization frameworks offer one of the best ways to do this. From frameworks based on high levels of process, though to ones that are more fluid (and can be done at short notice with a team and a whiteboard), this article describes the preferred techniques of product managers.
I hope these articles offer ways to build upon your practice. If you have any techniques or experiences you would like to share, please leave a comment below.
