Mission and Vision Statements

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Have you had an opportunity to think about where you want to be? Writing a mission statement can help you achieve that. Company’s do it all of the time. Why not do it for yourself? What is your Mission for yourself? Writing a mission statement for your business tells your colleagues, employees and customers what your business intends to do and how it will do it. Writing a mission statement for yourself tells you what you intend to do. It will help to hold you accountable.

Use your mission statement to describe yourself in present terms. Be sure to include measurable goals and objectives. A vision statement is very much like your mission statement, except it outlines where you would like to be in the future. The vision statement should show others how you want to be perceived.

Your mission and vision statements should be clear, interesting and engaging. The best thing to remember is not to make your statements too complicated. After all, you want to make sense and you want others to be able to understand them.
Here are some helpful tips:

• A Mission Statement should be in the present tense, include overall goals and most importantly, how you will get there.A mission statement does not define a long term future state but is more concerned with the present state.
• It answers the questions of: “What do I do?”, “How do I do it,” “Who do I do it for?”, “What makes me different”, and “What is the benefit?
• The statement talks about the present leading to the future, and how you will get to where you want to be.
• A Vision Statement should be in the future tense. In other words, think about how you see yourself in the future and where you want to be during that time.

Think through the questions below as you develop your statements:

Step 1: Answer the following questions as honestly as you can.

What personal qualities do you most want to emphasize in yourself?
How can you use and display these qualities in a working environment?
What are the most important values you want to express at work?

Step 2: Visualize yourself five years from now.

Imagine that you are managing and leading the project of your dreams. Envision that everything is exactly the way you want it to be: the type of project you are running, the industry it is in, its size and complexity, the people involved, and your own capabilities as a project manager and leader. Imagine that you are every bit as successful as you want to be. Feel it and see it.

Keep imagining yourself in the future, and be as specific as possible in your observations. Where exactly are you? Who is your client? What are you doing? Who are you interfacing with? What does the project look like? How big is it? How are you feeling? Why do you want to be exactly where you are? What is the bigger impact you are having?

Draw a picture of yourself and your surroundings five years from now. Draw the elements you see, feel, and hear. Use as many colors as you want and be as detailed as possible.

Step 3: Sum up your vision and mission.

Write to the following questions: How can you sum up your vision and mission as a in your personal or professional life? What are the things you ultimately want to achieve? Who do you want to be? What do you want to do? What is the impact you would like to have and how would you like to be perceived?
What will need to happen in order for you to feel proud of your progress as a project manager in five years’ time?

A vision statement describes what you want to achieve in the future.
The vision statement answers the question “Where do I want to be?”

It defines the optimal desired future state—the mental picture—of what you want to achieve over time, say in five, ten or more years.
It inspires you to give your best and shapes your understanding of why you are doing what you do.

Hopefully, you are able to turn your answers into a well-crafted mission and vision statement for yourself. Give yourself as many drafts as you need to refine it. Remember it should express the values that you would like to live and work by, and that above all you must feel excited and inspired by it when you read it aloud. Here are some great examples of mission statements from some very familiar celebrities.