Mission Statement Idea

 Hi

I am the managing director of a civil construction company with about 55-60 employees. This is a family company, so as you would expect we are genuinely interested in continually developing a culture that’s both supportive to our people and our financial targets. This can be tough at times as the nature of our industry and local economy can be very bumpy, and then add wet weather. This causes our revenues to vary up to 40%, when converted to a line graph it looks like and ECG.

Despite this, I have found a large part of the success of our company and the ability to attract the right people and keep them was fundamentally attributed to our values. These have been handed down from my father to me and from grandad to dad, you get the picture. About two years ago I decided to articulate these values and express them in a way that gives the company a clear understanding of what we believe and how we should behave when we come to work, hence our mission statement was born.

I made a big fuss over this document, I went and explained it to every individual and posted it where we could be constantly reminded of what we are about; the back of the toilet door was a master stroke. That said, as time goes by it has been a good set of beliefs, when things go wrong or we are faced with a tough decisions we can always return to it and the answer indirectly lies within.

So, I want to keep it fresh and it not to become some tiresome old document, I want to bring these words alive in a new and creative way. Here is my idea. We don’t have to spend a lot on marketing or advertising as other organizations may need to, as a result I have can afford to offer a cash prize. The rules to gaining this cash prize are as follows;

In a period of one calendar month anybody who can recite our mission statement word for word without assistance in our office will receive a cash prize of $100.00.

You get one shot at this and the deal ends at the end of the elected month.

BTW its only 300 words.

Does anybody think this idea has merit? Your thoughts or feedback will be appreciated.

Oh I almost forgot, I love manager tools and have found the most effective way to explain some of the wonderful concepts to our directs is to put the selected casts i wish for them to learn on a nano and ask them to listen to them and give it back at our next O3.

Paul