Vision forming busy buzzed business
November 1, 2009 § 4 Comments
Image via Wikipedia
This article is about how to use vision in business contexts. The things that show investors you are sensitive to their needs as well, for example. The word “investor” is here used for all that invest time and energy in maintaining relations with your business. Those are your customers, allies, institutes, …
The concept of vision is subconsciously related to mission (identity statement) and implies change and growth. It is a statement on what you or your business would like to become. It affects what commercialisation and marketing strategies you choose, and drives the development of your open-ended-planning-with-feedback-loops-and-obstacle-and-pitfall-avoidance.
In many cases, as a natural pattern, people limit their vision near the present situation. That’s the “official future”, the future we believe, either explicitly or implicitly, will happen. Usually we make that a plausible and relatively non-threatening scenario, featuring no surprising changes, not even in the face of the current economical and environmental crises. And in some circumstances the “official future” can reflect our fears, for example that the world is a mess, we in trouble, or that it is the business of any time, especially the future, to be dangerous. Which might actually be the case.
In title=”Humans planning illusionary scenarios” a href=”https://nynke.wordpress.com/2006/06/04/humans-planning-illusionary-scenarios/”>scenario planning we (temporarily) remove these constraints and focus on describing radically different and optimistic “blue sky” futures. Later we can add constraints when working backwards, and explore the present situation for including factors that would enable such a future to unfold. But first we reveal a vision that captures business imagination and energy. And then we ask some pretty darn good questions to build a “back of the envelope plan”, not a Big Design Up Front!
Product and services
What products and/or services will your business provide? Do you enjoy delivering these? What “hidden profits” can you find in your existing services? What customer problems will or do you solve?
What additions will you have made to strengthen your sustainable competitive advantage?
What will the work to be done be? Research? Development? Marketing? …?
Image
How will your business be positioned in the mind of your customers?
What will differentiate you from other businesses?
How will potential strategic allies or investors view you?
What will you look like?
What form will your business take? Think outside of the box! We are uncovering new ways of doing business …
Where will your business(es) be located?
Market goals
Who will be your customers? What market(s) will you serve? Geographic regions? Are you using push or pull marketing?
Financials
What are your ongoing financial requirements?
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