3 tips for communicating the vision, values & visible results

Imagine you are a leader. You want your leadership team to communicate what your organisation does – and do it in a succinct way. One approach is to educate people to communicate the vision, values and visible results. (Let’s assume that you are already clear on the values.) Here are three steps you can take to communicate what your organisation does.

1) You can communicate the vision.

Gather your team together and make three flip-charts headed: ‘Vision’, ‘Values’ and ‘Visible Results’. Give each person a pack of Post-It Notes. They are then to write their views on what can go under each of the three headings. Later they will each go to the front and place their relevant Post-Its under the specific headings. To begin with, however, ask them to complete their Post-Its for the individual sections.

Invite people to write a ‘one-liner’ summarising what they believe is – or should be – the vision. This sounds simple, but many organisations find it difficult, because it should crystallise the big ‘What’. So you may want to outline some guidelines. For example, it is: a) To be a one-liner that summarises the vision. b) To be no more than 13 words. c) To set an inspiring tone – the direction – for the organisation. Remind people that, despite their best efforts, it will be impossible to get ‘everything’ into the one-liner. But it should provide a starting point for being able to give examples that bring the vision to life. So invite people to complete the following sentence.

The vision we want to achieve is:

*

2) You can communicate the values.

Invite people to complete their Post-Its for the second part of the exercise. They are to write the values they want employees to follow to achieve the vision. You may have already done considerable work on defining the values – especially in terms of choosing to ‘live the values, rather than just laminate the values’. If so, great. If not, then this may be a good starting point for clarifying the values. Different organisations will, of course, choose different values. One company, for example, settled on theirs being: “Deliver results; Take responsibility; Care for people; Love change.” So invite people to complete the following sentence.

The values we want people to follow to achieve the vision are:

*

*

*

3) You can communicate the visible results.

Invite people to complete their Post-Its for the third part of the exercise. They are to describe specific examples of how employees have actually lived the values and produced visible results. Federal Express, for example, continually highlighted stories of their couriers going that extra mile to deliver exceptional service. So invite people to complete the following sentence.

The specific ways that people have demonstrated
the values and delivered visible results are:

*

*

*

Give people ten minutes to write Post-Its relating to the headings of ‘Vision’, ‘Values’ and ‘Visible Results’. Invite each person to then go up in turn and place their ideas under the respective headings. They are also to explain what they have written. Follow this with a short discussion about any of the points that have been raised. Explain that you will write up the flip charts and also aim:

a) To consider the Post-It Notes relating to the vision – then settle on a specific one-liner that summarises the ‘What’;

b) To meet again with the team and agree on the ‘script’ they can follow to communicate the company’s ‘Vision’, ‘Values’ & ‘Visible Results’;

c) To carry-out a plan for constantly collecting and communicating specific examples of what people are doing to deliver visible results.

This approach sounds simple – and it is – but that does not mean it is easy. The hardest part is often clarifying the vision – the ‘What’. But that is a vital step in defining what the company does. People can then transmit the whole picture by communicating the vision, values and visible results.