“Never be so focused on what you’re looking for that you overlook the thing you actually find.” – Ann Patchett
Last week in this space, the topic was vision. Creating a clear, compelling vision isn’t easy, and most organizations never really get it done. Even organizations that succeed in terms of vision are faced with a daunting reality: change.
After all the work we do on vision, and all the work we do to develop strategies that will make that vision a reality, and all the work we do to implement those strategies, we sometimes look up and realize things didn’t turn out the way we thought. The environment we were operating in changed, probably in lots of different ways, and we were so busy implementing things that were great ideas ten years ago that we missed what happened last week.
For a lot of leaders, it is exhausting to map out a path. To then have to immediately start adapting to a changing world is just too much. Most leaders are like most people in that they want to cross things off their to-do lists so they feel like they’re being productive. The idea that they need to be regularly evaluating the items on the to-do list is more than they can handle.
Too bad. Vision isn’t something you talk about once every five years. It’s not something you only think about when you have nothing else going on. It’s not something you delegate to somebody else. For it to matter – and it has to matter – you have to think about it daily.
Consider the vision you have for the organization you lead. Do you think about that vision every day? Do you think about how the things you’re going to focus on that day or that week are going to get you closer to that vision? Or do you spend months being busy without giving your vision a second thought, only to find yourself no closer to, or even further from, that vision?
I’m not suggesting you need to have a three-day visioning retreat every week, but you can’t just talk about it once every few years, either. For your organization to thrive, you need a clear, meaningful vision. To have a clear, meaningful vision, you need to return to it regularly, tweak it, and adjust the action steps you’re taking to get there.
Your vision needs to be a living, evolving thing. Living, evolving things need attention. Make sure your vision is getting the attention it needs.
