John Constantine wrote:
> As I understand and interpret the concept, a mission is something
> which should remain unfulfilled, able to be constantly improved upon
> by those within the organization.
I must confess that I have never thought of mission in this way but
concede that many mission statements are worded such that I feel it
would be difficult to "prove" that they had been achieved. I was always
taught that a "good" mission statement should enable an organisation to
establish relevant performance measures which when evaluated allowed you
to look back and say "Yes, that was done and done well"
My own organisations statement "Achieving a better community" has IMHO
merit because:
1. It allows everyone in the organisation the opportunity to link their
work - however humble - to the mission. In staff appraisals I now find
that colleagues can demonstrate how their efforts contribute to the
mission - previously they had great trouble making this link.
2. The wording is such that it does not prevent my efforts today from
being a fulfillment of the mission whilst keeping it as a perpetual
target for future efforts, changes and improvements.
3. It does allow for strategic change to be included, new opportunities
taken etc.
Has anyone other examples of mission statements that if we frame them
now with our LO perspective would help/hinder the process?
--Paul Murphy pbm8@cosy.open.ac.uk "They are poor explorers who think there
Learning-org -- An Internet Dialog on Learning Organizations For info: <rkarash@karash.com> -or- <http://world.std.com/~lo/>