Many business owners get preoccupied with the daily “grind,” sound familiar?

Lack of focus, growth stagnation, dwindle cash flow, operating debt, and many other indicators exist for the identification of the overly "busy" business owner.

When an owners says "I'm extremely busy," this often means they are overwhelmed by the feeling that they are peddling hard but not gaining any ground. The biggest excuse I hear to not hire a business coach is "I'm too busy, I don't have time." Ha! This business owner is stuck in an endless groundhog day of their business! They wake up every morning to start the same routine and peddle the same stationary bike in the hopes that they might get somewhere. It's likely that even if they were to gain traction, they would quickly realize they had not even determined their final destination.

But why is this? What is missing? How can this picture change?

Change is the operative word here. Through defining a clear vision and mission statement, it will lead to focus and accountability. That's whats lacking, that's what needs to change.

Defining a vision will give the owner something to aim at. Doing business without a Vision is like driving a car without a destination. Where are you going, why are you going there, how are you getting there, what route are you taking to get there?

Defining the Vision for the business is the key to giving it direction and purpose. From the vision, a strategy and mission statement can be formed, with goals and actions derived from the strategy, and with tracking back to the vision to align and focus everything that is performed by the business. Nothing is done that doesn’t relate back to the overall Vision.

In this way the "grind" can be separated from the real work that has to happen to grow and scale the business for greater profits and success.

Believe it or not, this is a natural transition point that all organizations go through and failure to recognize this as an opportunity to transition the business can have serious consequences.

Having a clear vision & mission for the business will help this transition and has the following great side affects:

• Leads to your strategy
• Provides direction and alignment
• Unifies business partners/employees
• Offers a clear message to potential clients
• Helps to achieve goals and bring focus

Deriving strategy from your vision is very important. This ensures that everything can be tracked back to the direction the company is taking. At INFIX we do this through a process called construct analysis.

Construct analysis is the method for taking the keywords or characteristics in the Vision statement that can be measured. For instance a word like “recognized’ would be a construct that can lead to a strategy of becoming a thought leader or authority in some vertical.

Goals and actions derived from the strategy then all feed back to the vision to align and focus everything we do. We don’t do anything that doesn’t relate back to the vision.

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Download the INFIX Vision & Strategy Guide
A worksheet to walk you through the process of writing your own mission statement. 

If you're ready to stop working IN your business and start working ON your business, download this step-by-step worksheet to walk you through developing your own Vision & Strategy plan.

By the end of the exercise, you'll have a clear mission statement with a construct analysis guide on goals you need to achieve to make your vision achievable and successful.