Looking into the Future...Creating a Compelling Vision for your Nonprofit

Quick: What is the vision for your nonprofit organization?

Do you know it by heart or did you cheat just now by peeking at the vision statement that is invariably pasted into the ‘about us’ section of your organization website?

What about the other employees in your organization? Would they be able to articulate your organizational vision? Do they understand what it even means?

Vision statements are usually cobbled together by the directors of the organization in some stuffy boardroom somewhere. This usually takes place during a strategic planning session and often involves a heated and drawn-out debate over using words like ‘lead’ instead of ‘influence.’

Yawn.

Your vision statement shouldn't be boring.  In essence it is a statement about where your organization is going to be in the next 5-10 years (and sometimes beyond).  Done right, it can serve as a focal point to direct everything that happens in your organization - From strategic planning, organizational restructuring, and program development to the many small decisions made by individual staff and volunteers on a day to day basis. 

Everything that happens in your organization is meant to deliver back to this jumble of words...so it’s pretty important that you get it right.

Good vision statements are ambitious, far-reaching and inspire all those involved to want to roll up their sleeves and make it happen. While every organization is different, I find those that achieve all this in as few words as possible hit home the hardest.

Here are a few good examples I've come across:

Pepsi Co:  "PepsiCo's responsibility is to continually improve all aspects of the world in which we operate - environment, social, economic - creating a better tomorrow than today"

Wal-Mart:  "To be the Worldwide leader in retail"

Charity: Water: “Our vision is simple and ambitious: Clean, safe drinking water for everyone on the planet.”

Canadian Cancer Foundation: “Creating a world where no Canadian fears cancer”

Feed the Children: "A world in which children thrive, free of poverty"

In getting started developing an inspiring and forward-reaching vision statement, consider asking your organization’s leadership to sit down together (preferably not in a stuffy boardroom) and come up with some answers to the following questions:

1. Imagine you were starting your association over again. None of the barriers that currently stand in your way exist.  What would the organization look like?
2. Imagine yourself well into the future. Your organization is receiving a prestigious award. As you are being introduced, which of your attributes and accomplishments are being celebrated? What is the award for?
3. Create some Big, Hairy, Audacious Goals (BHAGs) (Collins and Porras). These are ambitious and even outrageous goals that will serve to rev up your entire organization.

Once you have some concrete descriptors from the above exercises, you can then work on a concise and exciting statement that paints a picture of what it would look like to have achieved these future goals.

Does your NFP have an inspiring and ambitious vision? Please share it with us!

Photo thanks to Alasdair Thompson via Flickr

Comments

[Dan Clark]

I like it, especially the examples. Inspired by Jim Collin's "Built to Last," I'm helping credit union clients stretch from single to multiple-decade vision statements with compelling descriptions of conditions to create outside themselves, in the communities they serves, as your examples demonstrate.

[Carol-Anne Moutinho]

@dan - you might also like this recent post by John Haydon on creating a compelling Mission Statement (http://bit.ly/hPhm4T). At the end of it he writes: "State it simply – with balls – and then be done." So true! Thanks for your comment.