This post is part of the working draft of the DriverlessCrocodile Toolkit (read more here). I’d love comments, links to resources related to the theme, and original contributions.
We’ve worked from organisational Values (Foundations 1- 4) to Vision (Foundations 5-6) to Mission (Foundations 7-10). These make up the deep-level foundations for everything that you actually do:
- Values are the things that you think are important – the moral framework of how you think people (and your organisation) should be in the world. It’s your moral compass and sets the most important boundaries for your work, including what you will do and won’t do, and who you will and won’t work with.
- Vision is the top-level change you seek to make – the world you want to bring into being, probably as a result of some state of the world that’s at odds with your values. It’s the thing that you’ll communicate when you’re looking for partners, friends and champions for your work – the “why” that people will buy into.
- Mission is the next level, overarching “what we’re going to do about it” at the broadest and most strategic level. This is the thing you’re going to use to decide what to do next.
These things set the tone of your organisation, set the agenda, and set the direction of movement, and they’re the lens you use for deciding everything that you do and (as importantly) what you don’t do.
The next step is to use these to make a plan for the actual work you’re going to do – and then to get on with it. To do this, the next step is to develop a combination of what I’m calling (for now, as I work on these ideas – and building on a comment from John Greenall) core activities and strategic goals. More on these in future posts.