7.1. Vision and Strategy

A vision is a target, a picture of the future. A strategy is a roadmap, how you're going to achieve the vision.

Over the past decade, many business leaders have consumed a lot of time, energy, and money creating fancy vision statements. They've marched their leadership teams off-site for a few days and "wordsmithed" lofty phrases that in the aggregate read pretty much like everybody else's vision statement. Returning to their offices, they called in their public relations folks and directed that the new vision statement be printed on posters, pens, wallet cards, coffee mugs, ballpoint pens, pyramids, table tents, balloons, and anything else they could think of. Leadership then returned to business as usual, thinking ...

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