(But a lot of people don’t know the difference)

We’ve all heard strappy, catchy mottos of a ‘vision’:

Achieve your potential (this one always makes me giggle, because I wonder what do you do when you have achieved it?  I like to think of potential as never ending, but I digress…)

These are great, snappy, one-liners which are easy to remember and help be a hook for what you do, for what your vision is, but they are not a vision in themselves.  If you have a motto and treat it like a vision, you’re using the wrong tool for the job.

And when you use the wrong tool for the job, the job is harder and sometimes impossible to achieve. Who would use a monkey wrench to hammer a nail into the wall?  If you don’t have the right tool (a vision) doing its job, it’s going to be harder to achieve.

It’s not often a vision can be summarised so succinctly; great visionaries articulate their visions at length and then have key phrases (like mottos) which serve as a shortcut to the overarching vision.  But the vision itself is a picture of what will be created, and a sentence or a few words has seldom, if ever, achieved this.  If you know of one, then please share it with me, I’d love to see it 🙂

Top tip:  Check – is your vision really a motto?  If it is, then it’s a great aide memoir for your vision as long as you have a clear vision of what you want to create and that is shared.

Your vision might also be your mission; to know more about the difference, see my blog about the difference between a vision and mission.

About the Author

Sonia Gill is founder of Heads Up, specialising in supporting Head Teachers and School Leaders create an outstanding school culture. https://ukheadsup.com

photo credit: HikingArtist.com via photopin cc