In our experience, businesses who have taken a step back to look at their environment, look at the future, and look at themselves in an honest and robust way set themselves up well for future growth. This allows you to review what's currently working in your business, and importantly - what isn't.

Without a clear vision of where are you want to be, it is very hard to align your sales and marketing efforts. For successful business growth, you need to have a clear picture of where you want to be in 5-10 years. This is where a Business Growth Vision is needed.

What is a business growth vision?

Your business' vision is a statement of the desired future state. It should provide a clear picture of what you want to achieve and the direction of travel.

A successful vision will help you achieve a number of things:

• It will motivate your team

• It will help create a sense of belonging and meaning (or purpose)

• It will help establish a standard for excellence

• It will be the bridge between the present and the future.

This is why it's worth taking the time to think through what your vision is. If you're serious about growing your business, you're going to need a motivated team who do amazing work, as well as believe in what you're trying to achieve.

HOW DO I CREATE A VISION?

So you're on board with why you need a vision, but just how do you go about creating one? There are several different ways to create a vision for your business. There's no right or wrong but the important thing is to start writing it down.

Over the years, we've found that using the Collins-Porras framework works really well. From their study of hundreds of companies, Jim Collins and Jerry Porras defined a vision in terms of a core ideology (or a guiding philosophy) and an envisioned future (or tangible image of the future)..

Core values 

Collins and Porras define “core value” as a value  'so fundamental and deeply held that they will change seldom, if ever.' Think of these as the things as your organisational DNA. It's the stuff you'd do even if you didn't get paid for it. For example, being eternally curious. 

Core purpose 

A core purpose should help employees understand what they are working towards and how their efforts contribute to the organisation as a whole. It should encapsulate the essence of why the business exists. For example, Nike's core purpose is 'to experience the emotion of competition, winning, and crushing competitors.'

Big hairy audacious goal

Collins and Porras found that visionary companies often have big hairy audacious goals. The goals should stretch and inspire, be concise and easy to understand. In 1954, Sony's BHAG was to

'become the company most known for changing the worldwide image of Japanese products as being of poor quality.'

It's  probably safe to say they've achieved this.

Vivid description

You business vision should paint a picture with words of what the business will look like in 10-20 years. It should convey feelings of passion, emotion, conviction that will accompany the achievement of the goal.