Motivation Through Mission Statements

"How can I motivate the disparate group of work-shy gits I've been saddled with?"
"You can't".
"Well this'll be a quick course." comes the reply.
"No really - you cannot get people to do something they don't want to do - can you?"
"You can threaten them!"
"Oh that'll motivate them."
"You can give them more money."
"OK and that'll work..... for a little while. Within a few weeks they're the same as the rest of us - spent it before they've got it. Now you can really de-motivate them by taking that extra money away from them. Think about it. You give someone more money for a few weeks, then put them back on their old rate. Looking at it objectively they've earned more money than Ms Control working alongside them. But (and you know where this is going) who's the more motivated now? Exactly. It's dangerous to play this reward game unless you're willing to keep upping the stakes, or are prepared to take a great deal of effort setting it up properly to begin with."

A better way for sustainable, non-fragile, 'one thing goes wrong and we're all fed up again', motivation is to talk about it. Get the team together and work out exactly why we're here. Write a mission statement, a set of values, a credo, a code of ethics, a vision, a set of principles to guide us... call it whatever you like, but do it and do it properly. Don't get hung up about it being a mission, a vision, a set of principles - just use whatever terms work for you.

Mission statements have a bad press in many Organisations. They tend to be decided by a committee of senior managers then handed down to the staff in a similar manner to Moses' set of 10 value statements a long time ago. Ask staff what the mission statement is and the reply you tend to get is along the lines of;
"I don't know the words but the tune goes "da da da da da da da da, da da da da de" and there's something in there about being the best, oh and teamwork".

There are some truly great mission, vision statements. The best mission statement with split infinitive? - "To boldly go where no man has gone before...". Now that's a mission statement you would come in to work early for, right?

There is the story of a man walking around a large building and asking everyone their vision statement. They could all quote it. They all owned it. They could all see how the effort they put into their job helped to achieve their vision, from the higher paid technicians to the toilet cleaners. The man was John Kennedy and the vision, or challenge was "To put a man on the moon by the end of the decade."

Now if you can get all your staff to devise and live by your mission statement your problems are solved. So how do you do it? Well you don't - your people do. It's their statement, their vision and their values - let them come up with it. Give them time, space and the opportunity. Don't give them 20 minutes and then rush them back to work - give them a day, preferably with an overnight stay in a nice hotel thrown in, some decent meals. Let them spend the day identifying the mission, vision and values for the whole organisation.

In terms of the mission statement ask, "What is the purpose of the Organisation? What business are we in?" This isn't always as straightforward as it seems. In the sixties Parker pens had a crisis. They were losing money as biros came along and started taking their customers. They had a high level meeting to try to rectify the situation. The initial thoughts were to cut costs, compete with the disposable pens. This was a non-starter. They quickly abandoned this idea. Then they went back to basics and asked themselves what business they were in? If you own a Parker pen (especially in the sixties) I will bet you received it as a present. The vast majority of people did, still do. So Parker pens decided they weren't in the 'compete with Bic' business but in the gift business. This transformed the business strategy. Instead of trying to cut costs they actually made their pens more expensive - better packaging, up market advertising and it worked.

So back to your Organisation - what business are you really in? "We make pencils" - superb start. Next bit - "Lots of people make pencils. What's so great about your pencils?" "Our pencils are better than anyone else's pencils in the UK, no in Europe, no in the World." - OK now we're getting somewhere. Spend time on this. Find the best ways of describing it. Are they the best pencils in Europe? If not then maybe they should be, or maybe they aren't but they're the cheapest, or the most expensive, or the sexiest, or something.

Once that's agreed, totally and by everyone then you can look at the vision. Think of your Organisation in 10 years time. Draw it - if you need to. Yes, get people drawing how they see the future. Not a literal drawing of the finest pencil being produced but try to identify their feelings, their ambition, something real that they can identify "We want one of our dresses to be worn at the Oscars" would work. If you can identify something as concrete as this then all you need to do is work out what you need to do to achieve that. Talk about it. Get excited. Set a target, a date, something to aim for. Ask them how will they know when they've achieved it? "Edward will shut up."
"Edward?"
"He's our pain in the arse customer who's never satisfied."
What an incredibly powerful vision "To shut Edward up". Priceless.

Next you need to work out what business values will help you achieve that. Again make them real. "Good teamwork" is nonsense. "No bitching about people behind their backs" is better. When it happens you can use these values to address the problems. Get a list - get them agreed - get them used. Best one I've come across recently was "To what are we committed? Looking good or getting the job done." - If you're committed to getting the job done you'll make mistakes, you'll try different approaches, you'll ask naive questions - but that's OK. Isn't it?

The final part of this is where this process becomes real. Take a break and get your mission, vision and values written up neatly. Then ask the question" So why won't this work." And list 20 reasons why this won't work. List them all quickly - then go through them slowly and cross them off. Give jobs to people to address problems with real dates (no magic thinking). By the end you'll have a team that'll kill to achieve their vision - trust me.

Motivation - you needn't worry about it. They'll motivate each other and you as long as they believe.

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