Vision and strategy are both important. But there is a priority to them. Vision always comes first. Always. If you have a clear vision, you will eventually attract the right strategy. If you don\u2019t have a clear vision, no strategy will save you.<\/p>\n
I have seen this over and over again in my professional and personal life. Once I got clear on what<\/em> I wanted, the how almost took care of itself. Let me give you an example.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n In July of 2000, my boss suddenly resigned. I was already the Associate Publisher of the division, the second-in-command. With his departure, I was asked to take his job. I became the publisher of Nelson Books, one of the trade book divisions of Thomas Nelson.<\/p>\n I knew our division was in bad shape. But I didn\u2019t know how bad things really were until I became the publisher. I took a deep breath and began to assess reality. Here\u2019s what I found:<\/p>\n Honestly, things could not have been worse. However, as the new divisional executive, I recognized that things could not have been better for me. This was a great career opportunity. If I turned the division around, I would be a hero. If I didn\u2019t, that would be okay, too. After all, the division was a mess when I inherited it. I couldn\u2019t lose.<\/p>\n The first thing I did was to go off on a private retreat. I had one objective in mind. I wanted to get crystal clear<\/em> on my vision. What did I want to see happen? What would the division look like in three years? I didn\u2019t care about strategy; I was only concerned with vision.<\/p>\n Through the years, I had learned that if you think about strategy (the \u201chow\u201d) too early, it will actually inhibit your vision (the \u201cwhat\u201d) and block you from thinking as big as you need to think. What you need is a vision that is so big that it is compelling, not only to others, but to you.<\/em> If it\u2019s not compelling, you won\u2019t have the motivation to stay the course and you won\u2019t be able to recruit others to help you.<\/p>\n For example, if I had been strategic before I was visionary, I might have said, \u201cWell, I don\u2019t see how we can accomplish much. The situation is so dire. We don\u2019t have many resources to work with. Let\u2019s just try to get to break-even this next year. Maybe we can reduce our working capital some by selling off a little obsolete inventory. And, maybe we can sign a few new authors and get a little revenue growth.\u201d<\/p>\n Do you think anyone would have gotten excited about this? Would this vision have attracted the right authors? Would it have retained the right employees? Would it have secured additional corporate resources? I don\u2019t think so.<\/p>\n The problem is that people get stuck on the how. They don\u2019t see how<\/em> they could accomplish more, so they throttle back their vision, convinced that they must be \u201crealistic.\u201d And, what they expect<\/em> becomes their new reality. This is simply faith<\/em> applied negatively.<\/p>\n I didn\u2019t take this approach. Instead, I developed a vision statement that I<\/em> found compelling. If I couldn\u2019t get excited about it, I couldn\u2019t sell it to others. Instead, I gave myself permission to envision the perfect future. Here\u2019s what I wrote down:<\/p>\n Nelson Books is the world\u2019s largest, most respected provider of inspirational books.<\/p>\n Once I had this on paper, I came back to the office and called a meeting with my entire staff. I reviewed our current reality. I was brutally honest. The situation was dire, and I didn\u2019t pull any punches.<\/p>\n I then shared the new reality\u2014the vision\u2014and described it in as much detail as I could. I was genuinely enthusiastic and committed. Because I found the vision compelling, most of the them did, too. Some were slow to get on-board, but in the end, even the most reluctant ones came around.<\/p>\n I personally read through this vision daily. I prayed over every part. I asked God to guide us. Little by little, He brought us the strategy and the resources. However, I spent way more time\u2014probably ten-to-one\u2014focused on the what<\/em> rather than the how<\/em>.<\/p>\n When people would ask, \u201cHow in the world are you going to accomplish this?\u201d, I would just smile and say, \u201cI\u2019m not sure, but I am confident it is going to happen. Just watch.\u201d<\/p>\n And, guess what? It happened. I thought my initial vision would take at least three years to accomplish. Amazingly, we had an almost complete turnaround in eighteen months. We exceeded almost every aspect of our vision.<\/p>\n Over the next six years, Nelson Books was consistently the fastest growing, most profitable division at Thomas Nelson. It had one bestseller after another. It was home to almost all of our company\u2019s bestselling authors during that time.<\/p>\n This didn\u2019t happen because we had a great business strategy. It happened because we had a clear vision of what we wanted to achieve. That\u2019s where it started, and that\u2019s where you have to start if you want to experience a different reality than the one you have now, you have to get clear on what you want. Everything begins with vision.<\/p>\n To help you get started on envisioning your future, I've created a free resource,\u00a03 Leadership Pitfalls to Avoid in 2020<\/a>. <\/em>Claim your copy here<\/a>.<\/p>\n Remember, everything begins with vision.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Vision and strategy are both important. But there is a priority to them. Vision always comes first. Always. If you have a clear vision, you will eventually attract the right strategy.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":45936,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[164,165,166,167,95,30,96,40],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n\n
\n