08/18/2024

Leaders: No One Cares about Your Mission Statement

Focus on this instead

How many hours have been sacrificed at the altar of the almighty mission statement? How many pressing issues have been sidelined while founders polish a sentence until it glistens with inspiration and promise? If you ask Danny Brooks, the answer is simple: "Way too [expletive] many."

Brooks—who worked as Starbucks' VP of innovation culture and as a designer at IDEO before cofounding boutique strategy consultancy Penrose three years ago—knows something about mission statements. He has helped dozens of companies, including some in the Fortune 100, clarify their message. In the process, he's become a bit of an expert in mission statements: analyzing them, breathing new life into them, and pulling the plug on them.

"The majority of mission statements simply don't work" he said. "They're just not as effective as people think they are, and they can be a massive waste of time." The smarter move, he believes, is to focus on your origin story. In fact, Brooks said, if he had to choose whether to put a mission statement or an origin story on a company's website, "I'd go origin story 100 times out of 100."

Please select this link to read the complete article from Fast Company.