Blind Spots of a Visionary Organization

Ironically, I had answered a portion of this question within our second case study - before reading this week's articles. Here is an excerpt that explains the blind spots I perceive within my company, which can be applied to any other organization:

"Roadblocks Obstructing Execution of the Vision

If a vision exists, but no one knows it, does it make an impact? The answer to this question may be a little more straightforward than the thought experiment of a tree falling in the forest.

While anyone within the organization can easily attain our exact vision statement, passion isn't easily transferred through text. It needs an intermediary to remind folks of the vision, why it's essential, and how our work aligns with it. We need facilitators to connect the dots for those teammates around them. Movements and visions either thrive or die because of communication. The further down the organization chart, moving away from our C-Level leadership, I find limited dialogue surrounding "A world with healthy women, babies, and families." I trust this is not deliberate, just an unfortunate occurrence of top-down communication."

After reading this week's articles, it's clear that visions fail when middle and lower-management don't embrace them. The vision gets lost, and team members may feel confused about how they should execute their responsibilities.

Why can't some (people/organizations) wrap their minds around future-back thinking?

Most folks defend their silo and are willing to die on it. Perhaps they found that a particular way of doing things has been effective for them, and maybe even their peers. When something threatens their beliefs, they defend against it. As Mark Lipton shared, "without substantive ideas and concrete actions, the (vision) process becomes a joke."

Here are two examples of leaders who mocked visions:

John Rock (General Manager of GM's Oldsmobile): "a bunch of guys taking off their ties and coats, going into a motel room for three days, and putting a bunch of friggen' words on a piece of paper - and then going back to business as usual."

George H.W. Bush (41st US President): "the vision thing."

While it'd be a stretch to claim that their reluctance to embrace a vision led to the following facts, it's fun to note that:

• John Rock was the GM when General Motors decided to discontinue Oldsmobile.

• George H.W. Bush wasn't re-elected to a second term as US President, which only occurred four times in the 20th century.

Nufer Yasin Ates, Murat Tarakci, Jeanine P. Porck, Daan van Knippenberg and Patrick Groenen's "Why Visionary Leadership Fails," featured in Harvard Business Review (2019)

Mark Lipton's "Walking the Talk (really!): Why visions fail (2004)

Posted 3/18/21