Mission statement is as valuable as the vision statement, goal, purpose, objective, strategy, tactic, structure, and culture. All of these elements are very important and are intertwined workings together to guide and enrich the company in the right prospering direction. The mission statement in comparison is just like the identification of the problem; it is an initiative step to define the job description and its destiny. It can be used as a tool to influence all potential stake holders and/or the boss of the company to agree upon the direction, mission, responsibilities, and accountability of every involved party.

Another way to think of it is to compare the mission statement with the contract between someone conducting business with someone else. It requires the two parties to establish a contract to develop a common ground or an understanding, of whom doing what to get what he or she has promised to take action for the right to obtain it. For example: I want to obtain a master degree in business administration. In order to get the degree, I need to make a careful plan with the school I enroll. This plan may require me to adjust my daily schedule so that I can successfully accomplish my goal.

My mission might be just a statement that state like this: I do whatever; I have to do in order to earn my master degree within two years. After I have agree to attend the school and promise to show my commitment reflecting the school’s requirements, I then establish my strategy and tactic to make sure I will stay on course so that I have the ability to master all difficulties to accomplish my mission: obtaining the MBA degree. Yes, without the mission statement for me to cling on and drive myself toward the goal setting, I will not be able to accomplish. Most importantly, without the tactic or the object from day to day accomplishment, the long goal mission will wear me out or fade me from my focus of accomplishing the MBA degree.

If I get a loan to help me, I have to assure my lender of my accountability and responsibility to return the loan six months after graduation. Without certain types of committed statement, the lender may decline my request for loan. Therefore, in reflecting the above statement, I would like to conclude that the mission statement is vitally important beyond the job description. Furthermore, the mission statement as well as the vision statement should be memorable and short that five grades can recall and memorize. I would suggest for the length to be under twenty-five words fill with picture, illustration, or influenced words.

A mission statement is a brief description of a company’s fundamental purpose. A mission statement is a statement given by the company telling us, “Why do we exist?”

The mission statement justifies the organization’s reason for existing as well as describes the company’s purpose both for those in the organization and for the public.

Here comes confusion – The Vision Statement

The difference between a mission statement and a vision statement is that a mission statement focuses on a company’s present state whereas a vision statement focuses on a company’s future.

Every business should have a mission statement, as it helps ensuring that everyone in the organization is on the same track and to serve as an effective tool for business planning. 

Effective mission statements commonly clarify the organization’s purpose whereas Commercial mission statements often include the following information:

®      Purpose and aim(s) of the organization

®      The organization’s primary stakeholders: clients/customers, shareholders, etc.

®      How the organization provides value to these stakeholders: by offering specific types of products or services, etc.

According to Bart, the commercial mission statement consists of 3 essential components:

1.       Key market – who is your target client/customer?

2.       Contribution – what product or service do you provide to that client?

3.       Distinction – what makes your product or service unique, so that the client would choose you?

For further clarification, let us analyze two famous companies and organizations of our daily life and their mission statements:

WIKI LEAKS:

Launched:  4th October, 2006

Founded By:  Julian Assange

Business Nature:  Non-profit Organization

Business Type:  Document Archive & Disclosure

Website:  www.wikileaks.org

Image via Wikipedia

WikiLeaks is an international non-profit organization that publishes submissions of private, secret, and confidential media from anonymous news sources, news leaks, and its agents. Julian Assange, an Australian Internet activist, is generally described as its founder, editor-in-chief and director.

Mission Statement:

“Our mission is to create an un-censorable Wikipedia for untraceable mass document leaking and analysis.”

Volunteers:

WikiLeaks relies heavily on volunteers as a mix of journalists, mathematicians, and start-up company technologists from the United States, Taiwan, Europe, China, Australia, and South Africa. In January 2010, the WikiLeaks team consisted of five people working full-time and about 800 people who worked occasionally.

 Due to both having the term “wiki” in their names, WikiLeaks and Wikipedia have NO affiliation with each other. 

Financing:

As a non-profit organization, WikiLeaks is dependent on public donations. Its main financing methods include conventional bank transfers and online payment systems.

Major Accomplishments:

 In April 2010, WikiLeaks published a gunsight footage from the 12 July 2007 Baghdad airstrike, in which Iraqi journalists and children were killed by a US Apache helicopter, as the “Collateral Murder” video. 

 In July 2010, WikiLeaks released “Afghan War Diary”, more than 76,900 documents about the War in Afghanistan - not previously available to the public.

 In October 2010, the group released a package of almost 400,000 documents called the “Iraq War Logs”. This allowed every death in Iraq, and across the border in Iran, to be mappe

In April 2011, WikiLeaks began publishing 779 secret files relating to prisoners detained in the Guantanamo Bay detention camp.

Criticism:

Image via Wikipedia

WikiLeaks has gained a lot of praise but also suffered great deal of criticism because of the disclosure of top secret and confidential documents of the Governments unwillingly. Therefore, several countries like Australia, Germany, China, Iceland, Thailand and United States have blocked the website and blamed Julian Assange for stealing their private data and publishing it. WikiLeaks Facebook page was also deleted. Assange has also been captured and sent to jail several times for violation of privacy, according to US.

In a response, Assange criticizes the US Government for the lack of freedom of speech. According to him, his organization’s basic motive is to reveal the truth and make the public aware about what is happening behind the curtain. Later, Facebook restored the official page of WikiLeaks and responded that it does not violate any terms and conditions of Facebook.

As on 17 November, 2011, WikiLeaks Facebook page had more than 1.9 million fans.

Conclusion:

After analyzing the above discussion, we conclude that WikiLeaks has stick to its mission statement since the beginning. All of its acts and working are a part of its mission that is ‘expose the truth’ and it has helped WikiLeaks in accomplishing its goals. That is why, despite of severe criticism by top nations, it is highly praised and positively reviewed among the media all over the world.

APPLE:

Image via CrunchBase

Launched:  April 1, 1976 

Founded By:  Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak, Ronald Wayne

Business Type: Computer Software, Consumer Electronics, Digital distribution

Revenue:  US$ 108.249 billion (2011)

Website:  www.apple.com

Apple Inc.  is a multinational corporation that designs and markets consumer electronics, computer software and hardware, and deals in personal computers as well. The company’s best-known hardware products include the Macintosh, the iPod, the iPhone and the iPad. Furthermore, it produces copyrighted softwares itself for Mac, iPod, iPhone and iPad known as iOS. It has also created a top-rated web browser known as Safari for computers. As of July 2011, the company operates 357 retail stores and working with 60,400 employees.

Mission Statement:

“Apple is committed to bringing the best personal computing experience to students, educators, creative professionals and consumers around the world through its innovative hardware, software and Internet offerings.”

Innovations – That changed people’s lifestyle

Since from the beginning, Apple always presented something different from its competitors. The Tech-Genius of this decade – Steve jobs – said that they simply took a product and “re-invented” it. This helped Apple created the most demanding consumer products in the past 20 years. For instance:

ü  Record Players to >  iPod – MP3 Player with headphones

ü  Call/Text Cellphones to >  iPhone – Internet Communicator, Audio/Video Tracks, Touch Display Input, No Keypad

ü  Laptops to >  iPad – Large Display, Touch Input, No Keypad, Simple User Interface, 13mm Thick, No Wires

Each of these products proved an burst in the field of technology and revolutionized the gadget world. Thus, Apple entered in a monopolistic like situation. As of September 2011, Apple has been the largest publicly traded company in the world by market capitalization, and the largest technology company in the world by revenue and profit.  In July 2011, Apple’s financial reserves were greater than those of the US Government.

What Made Apple So Strong?

Due to its philosophy of comprehensive different, unique and wonderous design to its distinctive advertising campaigns, Apple has established a solid reputation in the consumer electronics industry. This includes a strong customer base from all parts of the world that is devoted to the company and its brand. Fortune magazine named Apple the most admired company in the United States in 2008, and in the world in 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011.

Indeed, it is surprising to see the intense attraction among the apple users for the apple products. Steve Jobs once said: “It is really undeniable that some people have a ‘licking’ feeling for the apple products.”  This was because the apple products were made so stylish, shiny, catchy and had a perfect look that people can’t resist touching it. It is really an unseen – remarkable display of consumer demand.

Steve Jobs Death:

Image via CrunchBase

On August 24, 2011, Jobs resigned his position as CEO of Apple due to health issues and Tim Cook took his place. Steve Jobs was suffering from pancreatic cancer from several years. On October 5, 2011, Jobs died leaving his unforgettable legacy behind. People from every field of life termed it as a ‘tragic incident’ and a loss of a creative and visionary genius.

 Future:

Many critics predicted the fall of Apple after Jobs death and the market shares of Apple dipped down suddenly. But within 9 days after Jobs died – On 14 October, 2011, Apple released the successor of iPhone 4, The iPhone 4S, which sold over four million iPhone 4S’s in the first three days of release – breaking any other cellphone record ever. This proved a painful blow to all the competitors and rumors spread by technology pundits.

Conclusion:

From the above detail, we come to know that to be successful and pioneer in the market, one should never leave its basic motive even when you are running through recession. Just like Apple, being innovative and unique attracts criticism but it does not harm you when the consumer is on your side. Even when Steve Jobs died, Apple firmly stuck to their mission statement and made a remarkable come-back in the market without their leader. That is why, Apple has always an edge over its competitors when comparing technology.

Personal mission statement focuses on your character i. e what we want to be and what we want to achieve in our life. Every persona is unique and the personal mission statement reflects the uniqueness in it. I call it Personal constitution which is basically not changeable. There can be amendments in it but one should have it. The constitution of a country is a standard by which law of that particular country is apprised. I must say that it is a standard criterion by which many things are evaluated and aimed at.

Some times it can be seen that organizations have a mission statement but they don’t follow them resulting in failure of achievements of goals. Top executives forgot what to achieve and what is important for the whole organization. But for an individual it is more important to have a mission statement and he must comply with it. 

Personal mission statement should be based on correct principles which should be a standard for the individual. Thus it becomes a personal constitution. It is basically a base for making major, life time decisions according to the circumstances. As change is a way of life and people can’t live with change if there is no ambition to change itself. If we have a mission statement we can adopt change and we would not be needing prejudgments and discrimination. We would have a smooth flow of decisions and we don’t need to figure out everything in our lives.

Our surrounding is changing rapidly with strong pace and this rapid change can be harmful for people who feel they can’t handle change. Most of the time they are reactive and give up, thinking that things that are happening to them would be settled down.

Once we have a mission statement we have the essence of our own proactive will. We would have vision and values which will direct our whole life. Our short term and long-term goals would be achieved by direction provided in our mission statement.  Finally I would conclude that Correct principles do not change.

Picture source

It is common for a business to create, update, rework and live by a mission statement. Most people expect an established institution to have one. It is often created more for the benefit of the establishment than for the public as it is a marker: an intangible statement of the tangible goals of the company.

It acts as an inspirational reminder for what the company stands for creating a self-fulfilling prophesy of success. This idea can be equated to the idea of the basketball coach who tells his players to envision making the basket; to close their eyes and see the basket being made. This is a mental mission statement. And it works.

So why not apply this method to the everyday lay person’s life? Take this philosophy to the next level.

I propose that people start creating mission statements for the lives they want to lead; for the lives they dream of and want to create for themselves.

This is something that one MUST write out and keep posted in clear sight. It is a statement that one must modify when one’s vision expands for the better.

Having a constant reminder of one’s goals will create many things.

1. The act of writing will solidify one’s dreams in a tangible form.
2. It is evidence that illuminates what one wants.
3. It is taking a step to say that one believes in one’s self.

The list of benefits could fill pages.

Any idea that can make one’s dream a reality is worth investigating!!

Best wishes and success in all your endeavors!

Thank you for reading!

Joie Schmidt © Copyright 2007 All Rights Reserved.

==================================================================

Dreams of the Heart – volume I by Joie Schmidt is available:

  * Volume I: Amazon Kindle, Adobe Reader, iTunes, iPod, iPhone, iPad and iBooks

Dreams of the Heart – volume II is available:

  * Volume II: Amazon Kindle, Adobe Reader

———> Stay tuned . . . vol. II will soon be available on iTunes, iPod, iPhone, iPad and iBooks!

(*In memoriam of the tragedy in Japan all proceeds from – volume I – sales will go to the relief efforts until 3/11/12)

==================================================================

For more great reading:

• B12 Shots: The Newest Energy Booster
• Plan to Keep Your Dreams in Focus
• Diamonds in the Rough: Independent Artists
• Celery: Do Your Body Refreshingly Good
• Always Look for the Best in Others
• The Value of Keeping a Diary
• What is Your Biggest Fear?
• Stumbling on Happiness
• When the Night is Blue (poem)
• If I Tell You I Love You (poem)

Do you have a story, poem, artwork or photography you’d like to share and earn residual income for life? Please check out this site to earn limitless income for life: Triond