I've worked in major corporations helping them to craft vision statements - watching them spend millions of dollars and hundreds of hours boiling down the hopes and dreams of the folks in charge to a few simple statements that will "rally the troops" and keep the organizations focused. And I have to tell you, that visions can be very important, but in young companies that have so many possibilities, a long-term vision may complicate matters and can distract you from REAL WORK right now.
I know - this sounds crazy to some of you, but hear me out. We have current clients that love our work. We're being asked to do more work for clients than our original contracts. And the work we're being asked to do is all good work that we enjoy and fits in with our long-term vision. But here's the rub: when we're delivering for these clients and building these programs, sometimes we're not working on the parts of the business to meet our long-term vision. It's a constant balancing act.
Right now, we're building a new public seminar (Communication Secrets of High-Performing Sales People) that fits into our long-term vision and will generate new clients for us. While we're pouring our hearts and minds into this new program, we're putting other programs and business critical issues on the back burner. It all comes down to resource allocation (time, money, etc.). Reminding ourselves of the long-term vision is a good thing. Staying focused so we can generate cash to stay in business and generate new customers is more "critical" at this point.
If you have ideas how to manage this better, hit us back on the comments below. We know thousands of other business owners must be dealing with these same issues :)
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