In the early phases of an organization, a company’s vision comes directly from its early leaders; it is very much their personal vision. To become great, however, a company must progress past excessive dependence on one or a few key individuals. The vision must become shared as a community, and become identified primarily with the organization, rather than with certain individuals running the organization. The vision must actually transcend the founders.

Vision Component 1: Core Values and Beliefs

Core values and beliefs are where vision begins. Core values and beliefs are like an ether that permeates an organization—its decisions, its policies, its actions— throughout all phases of its evolution. Some companies refer to this as their “guiding philosophy.”

Core values and beliefs form a system of fundamental motivating principles and tenets—precepts about what is important in both business and life, how business should be conducted, its view of humanity, its role in society, the way the world works, what is to be held inviolate, and so on. You can think of it as analogous to the “philosophy of life” that an individual might have. Core values and beliefs are analogous to a biological organism’s “genetic code”—they are in the background, but always present as a shaping force.

The core values and beliefs come from inside you. You, as a leader of the company, imprint your personal values and beliefs about life and business through your daily actions.

And therein lies the crucial aspect of core values and beliefs: they must be an absolutely authentic extension of the values and beliefs you hold in your own gut. You don’t “set” values. The proper question isn’t, “What values and beliefs should we have?” but rather “What values and beliefs do we actually hold in our gut?”

Ultimately, core values and beliefs get instilled by what you do, by specific, concrete actions, not by what you say.

To be effective, a vision must fulfill two key criteria: it must be clear (well understood) and shared by all the key people in the organization.

The Three Legs of Setting Strategy:

VISION:

Core Values and Beliefs

Purpose

Mission

INTERNAL ASSESSMENT:

Strengths & Weaknesses

Resources

Innovations & New Ideas

EXTERNAL ASSESSMENT:

Industry / Market / Current Trends

Technology Trends

Competitors

Social & Regulatory

Macroeconomy & Demographic Trends

International

As described earlier, one of the primary functions of corporate vision is to add meaning, to be a source of motivation for extraordinary human effort. A clear and compelling vision is essential to people seeing the importance of their work. If you haven’t yet read Chapter 4 on vision, read it. If you haven’t set a vision, do so.

Also, remember that one of the components of a good vision is a set of core values and beliefs, a set of guiding principles and precepts. This underlying set of core values plays an essential role in guiding people’s daily behavior and standards. In fact, there is a direct link between values and tactical execution. For example, if one of your core values is “treat customers like human beings” and if it is well inculcated through your organization (as it is at L.L.Bean), people are going to treat customers like human beings.