The End of the Beginning

'This is not the end.  It is not even the beginning of the end.  But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning."  Winston Churchill

As we begin to close out the end of yet another school year, athletic season or fiscal year, it is often fashionable to spend countless hours meeting and evaluating the end of the year, in preparation for the new.  We often meet; evaluate; meet again; establish a committee; continue to meet; all in an effort to fine-tune or perhaps draft an elegant vision statement, value statement, mission statement, purpose statement, objectives statement and so on.

Such projects are are all fine and good - indeed, they can be quite useful - but they're not the essence of a visionary school, team or company. Just because a company has a vision statement, in no way does it guarantee they it will become a visionary company!

The essence of a visionary company, school or team, comes in the translation of its core ideology and its own unique drive for progress into the very fabric of the organization - into goals, strategies, tactics, policies, processes, management behaviors, structures, building layout / assignments, job designs / responsibilities - into everything that the company does.

A visionary company creates a total environment that envelopes employees and team members, bombarding them with a set of signals so consistent and mutually reinforcing that it's virtually impossible to misunderstand the company's ideology and ambitions...this, in essence is it's Purpose! 

So as you close out your year - save your creative energies and fore go that committee of reinventing your "statements", but focus your attention and creative landscape of your organization by making certain that your core ideologies become evident in every member of your organization or team, in every facet of the organization both seen and unseen.  This truly will mark the end of the beginning!