Week 7 - Mission and Vision

The Steering Committee has crafted first drafts of both a mission and vision statement for the library. We expect these documents to be revised a number of times before we are done. At this week’s meeting the committee reviewed and discussed what we have so far. Next, we will be asking staff for your input on these documents.

On March 19th, from 11-12, staff will be invited to join the Steering Committee for a discussion of these draft documents. We hope you will consider attending. Please check with your supervisors and mark your calendars! We plan to post the draft statements prior to the meeting so keep checking the bulletin boards.

As a guide for some of our work we have been referring to the book “Strategic Planning for Dummies” by Erica Olsen. She identifies some of the elements that should be found in good mission and vision statements. To get you thinking, here they are:

Elements of an effective mission statement:
Focuses on satisfying patron needs
Based on our core competencies
Motivates and inspires employee commitment
Realistic and clear : avoid making the mission to narrow or too broad
Specific, short, sharply focused, and memorable: write a precise statement of purpose that describes the essence of the business in words employees and patrons can remember us by.
Clear and easily understood
Says what the company wants to be remembered for: How do we want the world to think of us? The Mission statement can provide simple insight into why we do business.

Elements of a effective vision statement:
Audacious: represents a dream that’s beyond what you think is possible.
Capitalizes on core competencies: builds on what you’ve already established – strengths,
Unique capabilities, resources, and assets.
Futurecasting: provides a picture of what your business looks like in the future
Inspiring: creates enthusiasm and poses a challenge.
Motivating: clarifies the direction in which we need to move and keeps everyone pushing forward to reach it.
Purpose-driven: gives employees a larger sense of purpose, so they see themselves as building a cathedral instead of laying stones.

Sound challenging? It is!