VISION STATEMENT

In the previous article about Leadership, was mentioned that a Leader must have a Vision, which must be shared with the team. In this article let's talk about the Vision Statement, which will help you apply in your organisation, in case you don't have one yet.

Where your organisation is headed? The answer for this question will be the Vision Statement, however let's talk how to define it.

What are the characteristics of a Vision Statement?

1.  Future casting
• Using a gerund verb to define your future casting.
2. Clear and Visible
• Metaphoric speaking, if you can actually see yourself in top of that mountain, your team will see either.
3. Audacious
• Thinks big, being audacious, thinking in what you want to accomplish for your organisation.
4. Descriptive
• Use a single sentence, which is the vision description.
5. Time bound of 5 years (3 up to 10 also works, however I recommend 5 years)

Looking at a diagram representing where your organisation is right now, point 'A', and where you wanna be in 5 years, point 'B'. If you think on how you're going to get there in point 'B' and the gap in between 'A' and 'B', then it drives you to the Mission statement, which answer "why your organisation exist"; but 'B' is your Vision statement, "where your organisation is headed".Why it is important? Will be a big problem if your Vision is out of the context of your Mission.

The purpose of the vision statement is to inspire, energize, motivate, and stimulate your creativity, not to serve as a measuring stick for success; that is the job of your objectives and goals, so following the rules, let's create Vision Statement for a car rental company, named "Super Rental":

1. Future casting
• We will be creating loyalty customers.
2. Clear and Visible
• We serve customers anywhere and quickly.
3. Audacious
• Our clients consider us the best company to rent, and our employees the best company to work.
4. Descriptive
• Be the most innovative car rental company in the world, delivering safe vehicles anywhere and quickly, for customer enjoyment, rewarding their loyalty, as well as the employees' accomplishments.
5. Time bound of 5 years
• 2011: In 5 years be the most innovative car rental company in the world, delivering safe vehicles anywhere and quickly for customer enjoyment, rewarding their loyalty, as well as the employees' accomplishments.

So, the Vision Statement for Super Rental company will be:

Vision

"2011: In 5 years be the most innovative car rental company in the world, delivering safe vehicles anywhere and quickly for customer enjoyment, rewarding their loyalty as well as the employees' accomplishments".

LEADERSHIP

Leadership must be shared because it is impossible for the leader to take care of everything and everyone, so he needs to delegate, allowing his followers to analyze the details, make choices, take decisions and actions.

As customer contact is essential to the business of a company, which will determine whether the customer will purchase and will become a loyal customer, the leader in his side, who is often away from these direct contacts, must be a server and coach of his followers, for they be able to perform this role very well. So, yes, this attitude will inspire and share the leadership with their followers.

Also, the leader must be visible and have ethical attitudes, as a leader does what he says, becoming an example to be followed, and this visibility is expected, and without this there will be no leadership.

Another important factor is to share a clear vision to reach the target with his followers, once is easier to achieve what we can see or predict. So, remain focused on his vision, correct the direction, think broadly and openly, overcome obstacles, lead and motivate, coaching periodically his followers are some of the leader's roles.

You have heard that no one leads a group of people to remain in place, unchallenged, unmotivated? Leadership involves a sense of change, where all are engaged to perform, for the action that leads to the realization of this change: a greater market share, consolidation of market leadership, a change in corporate structure, etc. 

Here six rules to help you improve your leadership:

• LEADER is the bearer of legitimate authority, the one in whom followers acknowledge their claim to be heard, respected and followed.
• LEAD is to connect your employees to your business.
• LEAD is getting and keeping employees who work and act like owners.
• LEADERSHIP is the art of getting desired results, agreed and expected by employees engaged.
• LEADERSHIP is the art of making others feel like doing something you are convinced that should be done.
• LEADERSHIP is the art of mobilizing others to struggle for shared aspirations.

"The only definition of a leader is someone who has followers. Some people are thinkers. Other prophets. The two roles are very important and necessary. But without followers, there can be no leaders" (Peter Drucker)

Also, know how to avoid common mistakes of a leader is crucial:

• Inability to interpersonal relationships
• A leader is primarily a manager of people, before being a manager of processes and operations. A leader who does not listen to his followers, does not communicate and think he is never wrong, certainly affect his relationship with his team, superiors and peers, also missing the opportunity to learn and innovate. So a leader with these characteristics will have difficulties in building a high performance team.
• Not open to new ideas, or different ones
• A big mistake is when a leader does not accept the ideas of others, since the idea does not belong to him. This suggests there is uncertainty, because the leader does not know everything.
• Not focused on results, nor take reponsibility
• The leader who is not focused on accomplishments will remain in a danger position, because it will reflect negatively on the goals, and worse, if the leader does not assume responsibilities that are inherent to his activity, the chaos is installed.
• Failure to take the initiative
• If the leader does not take any initiative, then someone will take it. In an increasingly competitive world, an initiative was not taken in time, will mean loss of market share to competitors.
• Inability to practice self-development and learning from their mistakes
• A leader who can not learn from their mistakes, will also have difficulties in having a high performance team as the team is a "mirror" of the leader, offering resistance to change and improvement.

So do not let your company go without a leadership, drive it as recommended in this article, working with your team, getting better results going forward.

Books recommendations:

Strategic Planning For Success: Aligning People, Performance, and Payoffs

Leadership: Theory and Practice

The People CMM: A Framework for Human Capital Management (2nd Edition)

COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGES

Your company don't need to be the best of the world, but must know their Competitive Advantages, so if you never dedicated time thinking on them, it's time to start, putting them in your Strategic Planning. However it can take months or years until you figure out what are your core advantages.

Begin looking for the "Competitive Advantages" asking:

1. On what, my company is the best? 
2. Why customers rent, or buy, from us?

Do this constantly until you have clearly identified the core advantages. Involve your team to help you find out the right answers, listing them as below:

On what, we are the best?	Why Customers rent, or buy, from us?
Making customers happy	They love our 100% dedication to understand and meet all their needs
Providing the best vehicles for safe driving	They know that our vehicles are in the fleet until 9 months or 100000 km of use, receiving periodical maintenance
Retaining the best professionals	They have experts and dedicated professionals, who understand the industry and their needs, always ready to help them
Controlling costs and calculating sales prices	They know that we offer the best prices, getting the best services and products
(...)	(...)

Maybe your list will be larger than this above, however after months or even years, you will reduce the items, getting focus actually on your Competitive Advantages.