What is a vision in business? And how do I find my vision?
It’s pretty easy to set a vision, I promise.
I know because I lead several groups of mid-career women, including my Career Strategy GPS program. A client who is a rising star in her business development org asked this question. She is constantly being validated for her work and given serious clients to work with but knows she needs feedback to get to the next level… and at review time, she also sensed she was expected to have a vision.
What is it exactly?
To her, it was this huge scary thing - like something that only Elon Musk gets to have. She wasn’t the only one in the group who felt this way.
But it’s really not. Or at least it doesn’t have to be.
I did this really powerful exercise with rising leaders, and I did it with the group.
We break a vision down into its smaller components so that in the end, this client had a 360 view of their vision.
This is when my client realized: visions are just an ideal future state or result. This morning, you woke up and thought, I’ll have a smoothie for breakfast.
That’s a vision. A low stakes vision but one nonetheless
Why does this matter?
Visions aren’t just for the very special. They’re for anyone with good ideas.
Demystifying vision means we open the door to many more types of leaders
Having and articulating a vision actually shows, not just tells senior leaders and decision-makers you are a forward-thinking leader worth investing in.
So for this client, having a vision for what her department could look like in a year was where she landed. It was clear, specific to her org’s unique needs and actionable. And most importantly, it showed she’d invested her precious time thinking about how to make the organization better. That she’d moved beyond the “me” mindset (what’s best for you) to the “we” mindset—what’s best for the org.
Put that together - in a presentation, an email, or a document - that’s a vision.
For my client, it resulted in a raise, promotion, and her first go at setting the strategy for transforming her org. Sounds like a leader to me.
If this resonates for the first time ever, here’s a step-by-step method to help you figure out your North Star and take the overwhelm or paralysis out of the process.