Recently I saw a drift among the younger members of my team regarding our vision and core values. I polled them on our vision, and while capturing parts of it, no one had several key words or concepts.
This is my fault as a leader.
As we built our team, it was upon a collection of strong values which guided us towards a corporate goal.
As we grew and time went on, I noticed a change.
The vision and values we espoused were championed by older generation, but seemed to bore the younger crowd when we would bring it up.
Not wanting to bore, I backed off.
This was a mistake.
As I have reflected on what I observed in my own team, I asked the following question.
How can we maintain the core vision and values as a team grows in numbers and in length of time with the organization?
Here are few of my thoughts:
Keep vision before them – Andy Stanley often speaks of how in his church, everyone knows, “We are a church to reach the unchurched.”
Revisit values often. Bill Hybels says in order to keep a vision fresh it must be restated every 30 days at minimum.
Engage this in new and creative ways. I realized part of my mistake in backing off with my team, was the feeling I was boring them. What I should have done was pull in other leaders to express the vision and values in creative ways. I should have staffed my weakness, in this case boring and outdated communication.
Remember. A repeated Biblical concept is that of remembering. We need to share the history of where we have come from and educate people as to the victories we have achieved through the years. These should serve as signposts which are tangible accomplishments pointing back to the core goals.
Stay willing to address the anti-values as they appear. We must be faithful to have the conversations with people when they walk in a way which is not consistent with our values. If we do not, the culture we worked so hard to achieve will slowly fade away.
In doing these things, we can continue maintaining the central and core vision and values to drive our organizations or ministries forward.
What strategies would you add to the list? What has worked for your team?