Thinking Through Your Personal Mission Statement
While you’re working on your entry for the Personal Mission Statement Group Writing Project, I thought it might be helpful to provide another example of what has been written in the past (not as a result of this particular project), and also some links to tips and advice on thinking through the process of writing one. None of them are specifically recommended (nor discouraged), but perhaps something will resonate strongly with you and aide you in your writing.
Lodewijk van den Broek not only created his Personal Mission Statement, but turned each piece of it into specific goals at his How to Be an Original blog. I like his advice on putting the mission statement together –
The process of sculpting the mission statement is a creative process. Take some parts, make phrases, shuffle them around, combine them, erase parts and so on. There’s no science in this, it needs to be a statement that feels right and has the right words in the right places for you.
Franklin Covey, who gets a decent chunk of money from me each year so I can keep my daily planner moving along, actually has an online Flash-based tool you can use to help you work through thinking about your Personal Mission Statement.
Randall S Hansen, PhD, has a nice, structured five-step approach to pulling together an effective Personal Mission Statement at the QuintCareers website. One of the many benefits of going through this writing exercise is coming up with a good filter to consider new job opportunities through in the future.
“A personal mission statement … allows job-seekers to identify companies that have similar values and beliefs and helps them better assess the costs and benefits of any new career opportunity.”
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Lodewijk said:
Thanks for the link, Iain!
I should add that I learned a lot about goal-setting since I translated my mission into goals. The technique still stands, but personally I’ve been a little too overambitious. But getting great progress nevertheless, because it’s aligned with who I am and what I want.
Outstanding Club » Writing Your Own Personal Mission Statement said:
[...] Thinking Through Your Personal Mission Statement [...]
Layla said:
Mission statemetns are critical for visually setting a goal and articulating what is most important and valued in your life/company. Companies and people reflect not only the specific vision and goals but also give a flavor of personality and the culture based on how the mission is written. For example, one of Nike’s famous mission statements was simply, “Crush Reebok.” This was not a flowery, long, detailed explanation of values but most certainly got to the point of the company culture. I was attending Scimitar Leadership Academy during a summer in college and we had to leave the trip with a personal mission statement. They provided many resources and books telling us how to write a mission statement, what is critical to include in a mission statement, etc. I found myself bound by these parameters and felt that it made the whole process formulaic and missing the authenticity a mission statement requires. This is, afterall, the values on which I am basing my life and goals and should be very personal. After many revisions I felt that I can sum up my values in the following:
Love Unconditionally.
Live Passtionately.
Always Bestow Beauty on Earth.
I would encourage anyone to at least give a personal mission statement a try and see where it leads them. You never know what you might learn about yourself when you start physically writing down your list of priorities and goals.