How to Better Communicate the Company Vision

How a new company vision is communicated to its employees has big implications for their ability to understand, absorb, and execute it. The often used top-down approach, where one individual or a small group create the vision and then communicate it to the organization, can pose critical challenges for the rest of leaders in the company, as their job to get their teams on board with the new direction is made unnecessarily troublesome. These challenges often include middle management experiencing a lack of ownership and reduced ability to lead others, which often result in employees referring to an increased sense of doubt and helplessness when trying to make sense of it all.  Such a top-down approach can be done differently and more effectively and it starts (as always) with senior leadership’s mindset and approach.

Co-creation

In sharp contrast to a top-down approach, co-creation includes all leaders in the visioning process. Senior leadership start the process, but include more leaders as the process progresses in order to make the vision sharper and more relevant to those that will be instrumental in executing it.

Co-creation minimizes the need for senior leadership to “sell” the vision to other leaders. These leaders were part of it, they made it themselves, they own it. This makes them the perfect promoters of the new vision and prepares them to give their people the guidance and support needed for executing the new company vision.

Also, by co-creating the company direction senior leadership will get the commitment of the other leaders to its execution. Middle management often resist change when using a top-down approach, but not so when they are included in the visioning process. Instead of working out the entire organization direction needed to perform better and having to deal with resistance from other leaders, senior leadership can focus on supporting the rest of the leaders to work out what they need in order to deliver their part of what they have helped build and committed to, including how to best support and communicate to the people reporting to them.

Phased approach

The communication rollout shouldn’t happen in one big hit. It should happen in calculated steps and in the right order and, as mentioned above, be part of the visioning process. A phased approach allows for leaders to be included when it’s crucial for their role to lead the people that will report to them. It also prevents some common problems from occurring, such as

• Leaders not being able to support their people in working out how they can contribute to delivering the vision.
• No one, except the senior leadership, knowing or understanding the company direction and the reasoning behind it.
• Lack of clarity about what’s coming next.

When using a phased approach, senior leadership makes everyone aware (first leaders, then everyone) that they are working on a new direction for the company. This way it doesn’t hit people unexpectedly. As the process moves on, they never bypass any leader if it concerns their ability to lead their people. By ensuring this, the visioning becomes sharper with more detailed and relevant input, and the communication occurs organically and more effectively. This will also benefit the organization when entering the execution phase.

Translating vision into action plans

Effective communication of a company vision should lead to everyone aligning to that vision and understanding what they need to do. This alignment occurs because it is clear why the change is needed, the vision is intellectually compelling and emotionally appealing, and the vision is translated accurately into action plans for people, teams, and departments.

It is crucial that leaders set the example on how people can translate what the new direction means to them, their team and their work. Leaders that have been part of the visioning process are particularly well equipped to do this. They are able to explain the process of how certain choices were made, allowing people to understand the specifics of how the new vision came into being. This strengthens the credibility of leaders and people’s trust in the new direction.

People in the organization who have other people reporting to them are by nature leaders, and to reiterate, senior management should always ensure that they are not bypassed when communicating news – preferably when it comes to vision, co-creating is a very viable and enriching approach that if undertaken correctly often leads to a sharper vision and superior performance in its execution.