How Will Your Company Mission Statement Direct Your 2017 Goals?
2017 is just around the corner, which means that it’s time to start thinking about your goals for the new year. Maybe it’s time to finally start training for a marathon or lose the extra holiday weight?
Hopefully, you’re also thinking about ways to improve your performance within your company. How were your car sales this past month? Were your lead conversions where you wanted them? How are your employees reacting to your management style?
Take a minute and think about your company mission statement.
Be honest, do you even know what it is?
I recently began reading Chip and Dan Heath’s nonfiction novel Made to Stick. The Heath brothers emphasize the importance of having a simple (but not dumbed down) company mission statement. A truly effective mission statement will direct all future company decisions, providing employees with the final desired outcome and allowing them to determine how they can achieve it.
For example, a recent DrivingSales News video featured the newly appointed CEO of Waymo, John Krafcik. Krafcik said about his intent for Google's new self-driving car company; “We’re a self-driving car company with a mission to make it safe and easy for people and things to get around."
Keeping the Heath brother’s formula in mind, Krafcik’s mission statement can easily direct Waymo employees to design a car that is safe. Sure, installing a Bugatti engine in that self-driving car might make for one heck of a test ride, but will it contribute to providing a safe and easy way to travel?
DrivingSales’ mission statement is; “We drive innovation and excellence in the retail auto industry by optimizing a dealership’s greatest asset, its people.”
We regularly use this to guide our choices, including simple decisions like purchasing higher quality sponsor collateral bags, rather than cutting corners at DSES.
It becomes slightly more complicated when we ask ourselves is, “Will this help DrivingSales remain vendor neutral?” or “How are we providing value for the dealers?”
So back to the question, what is your company mission statement? If you don’t know, it might be time evaluate your dealership and reframe your company goals.
2 Comments
Mark Dubis
Dealers Marketing Network
Having a clear goal for a person or organization is a critical component of achieving success, Mission statements are overused, mean little, and most of the time they are developed to make someone feel good about the company. If you asked readers of Driving Sales what your mission was, 90%+ would not come up with anything close to what you shared here. In looking at your current featured posts in the top slider not one of the posts focused on "optimizing a dealership's greatest asset." They focus on processes, technology, marketing tips (which employees have little or no control over), and the dealer's physical facilities.
When you come down to looking at companies that are admired and respected you see an overall culture where the people/employees are truly part of the family and everyone from the top down is expected to do the right thing for their customers. At our company we decided against a mission statement and instead adopted the Cowboy Code.. http://ilovemycustomer.com/the-code/ It just makes things simple.
Mark Dubis
Dealers Marketing Network
Sabrina; DrivingSales.com is one of my favorite sites to glean insights from industry professionals and from my discussions I have found that it is held in high regard by many dealer owners and managers. After giving your Mission Statement some thought, I would like to suggest for consideration one of these three alternatives.
Driving Sales Mission Statement (pick one) . . .
1. We work to drive improved performance by highlighting industry innovations in technology, processes, and development of personal communications skills to enhance the overall automotive retail experience.
2. To create a community where industry professionals can share insights, opinions, and advice to aid in improving the operations and perception of auto retailers in North America.
3. To engage participants from each of the auto industry segments (OEM s, Retailers, & Vendors) and encourages them to discuss ways to improve performance and professionalism in automotive retailing.
Please keep up the great work at DrivingSales.com. You and your team are much appreciated.
PS: Have a very Merry Christmas.