Vision, mission and culture statement

Introduction

An organization without a vision has no direction. Without a direction it will be difficult to jointly, as a team, head in the one single direction which will complicate both long- och short term planning and prioritization. It is therefore highly recommended to spend time on developing a vision statement for the work around network automation.

Defining vision, mission and culture statements tend to be perceived as "nice to haves" and many organizations spend less time, or even worse, spend no time at all on this type of work. The automation group is a new group within a larger organization and for all new entities people will be curious about what the purpose of this group is. Therefore, the mission statement is not only for the automation group's sake, it also useful when explaining and communicating to stakeholders why the automation group exists. It helps bring clarity and most likely decreases the number of potential misunderstandings around the automation initiative in general. Building a new practice that will change the way the organization operates, will put pressure on the executing group (Automation group) and its leader (Automation director) to be able to explain why this change is needed.

Below is a picture describing where the vision origins in the relation to objectives, strategy and plan.

Vision statement

A vision is a central piece in all organizations to be able to jointly understand where the the organization is heading. A vision statement is usually something unachievable that should inspire the organization to aim high and to work in the same direction. A vision statement usually has a horizon of at least ten years and could be much longer.

The strategy is the plan towards the vision. Please see the separate section about Automation strategy

Recommended reading: Built to Last: Successful Habits of Visionary Companies by Jim Collins and Jerry I. Porras.

Mission statement

The mission statement answers the question of why the organization exists. It basically declares the organization's right to exist. It can be segmented into three main components:

Target audience - who is the main consumer/receiver of the Automation group's offering
The key contribution - what does the Automation group offer
Uniqueness - in what way is the Automation groups offering unique

Culture statement

The culture statement is a descriptive document it is clear what culture the group aims and wants to have. It reflects how team members should behave, what to expect from peers and managers, how it should feel working for the group, etc. To define the culture statement it is suggested to have an open discussion with the team where all get the chance to openly share their thoughts and opinions about the team's culture.

In the culture statement it is for example declared:

How one should feel working in the team/group
How one should act in the team/group
What one could expect in terms of behaviour from colleagues within the team

Approach for developing Vision, Mission and Culture statements

An approach for developing and defining vision, mission and culture statements is to let someone external host workshops. People that would be target for such a workshop would be:

Automation director
Product owner
Network architect
Service architect
Operations stakeholder
Support stakeholder
Senior management

It usually pays off to let someone with previous experience from hosting these kinds of workshops due to that many opinions will be shared and the risk of a derailing discussion is pretty high. The structure of the workshop and the facilitator's ability to let all aspects get brought up are two critical factors for a successful workshop outcome. The risk for derailing discussion is high in these types of workshops due to all opinions being shared, as they should. Therefore, keeping the discipline to move forward in derailing discussions is central and often requires experience from facilitating similar workshops. Setting aside the necessary amount of time is prerequisite for getting solid and useful statements. The following setup could be guiding in terms of distributing your time.

First workshop - "Create statements" - Duration: 6 hours

2 hour on Vision
2 hour on Mission
2 hour on Culture

Target: All three statements in draft mode

Second workshop - "Refine statements" - Duration 3 hours

1 hour on Vision
1 hour on Mission
1 hour on Culture

Target: All three statements presentable to larger group

Document and display

When the statements are done it is important to document them in an understandable and easy consuming way. Store the documents at a place where team members and others colleagues easily can consume the material. Printing the statements and putting up on the walls in the automation group's area is also a way to keep the group aware and reminded of the three statements.

Best practices

Create a vision statement for the automation group
Create a mission statement for the automation group
Create a culture statement for the automation group
Engage external person to run workshops with the automation group to define vision, mission and culture statements

Checklist

Vision statement defined, communicated and documented
Mission statement defined, communicated and documented
Culture statement defined, communicated and documented