Why Vision Matters

The essential function of leadership is to work on the organization. Leaders are responsible for the improvement agenda which means leaders oversee change. If the organization doesn’t need to change and improve then leadership isn’t necessary, management will do just fine.

Any organization – for example, a business, a parish or school community – is a collection of human beings. The vested interests of those involved can be identical but often they are not. Sometimes those interests even compete with each other.

The first task of leadership is to create a shared vision worth doing in the first place. Shared vision is the rallying cry that supersedes conflicting interests and serves as a magnetic force of unity and alignment.

A vision that pulls people together needn’t require mindless conformity or robotic servitude. Nor should it suppress individual opinion.

Great leaders mine for conflict and promote ideological debate because constructive conflict is an important part of creativity.

Creativity is a building block of the improvement agenda and creativity begins with respectful differences of opinion. As individuals contribute their ideas and opinions and feel understood by others in the room, even if their ideas are not adopted into the vision completely, their investment and ownership of the shared vision increases.

Leaders work on the organization by continually forging the path toward common purposes. Shared vision transcends individual differences and unifies conflicting interests into a single, aligned, magnetic mission statement that articulates a rallying cry – a vision worth doing.