Inspired by my son…

Winning and Losing. It is something we all experience; something we all have to do.  In sports, games, business and government, one team wins and one team loses.  There are varying degrees of winning and losing, which becomes more complicated by what’s at stake.  A prize, a medal, cash, pride, etc. 

These competitions where we win and lose, go on everyday, every minute, throughout the world, everywhere you can imagine.  It happens on the on the ball field, with video games, during board games, in the classroom, in the boardroom and on the battlefield.  It happens with families, friends and foes.  It happens in our country, in third world countries, in all cities and communities across the globe. It is never ending.

What do those of us who hate to lose so bad...or love to win so much, that it is way more rewarding or devastating to us than other people?  We know who we are.  We know that we are more driven than other people.  What is it that is in us, unlike the majority of other people, that we are so driven?  Driven to succeed in sports, driven to succeed in business, driven to succeed in life.

This simple, everyday thing we call competition is so elementary to everyday life, and so complex and important to some of us, it takes us on constant roller coaster rides that test our success and coaxes our senses.  This thing we call competition, where someone wins and someone loses, is not always fair.  For those of us that thrive on it, we have to cope with the highest of highs and the lowest of lows.  This competition thing drives us to higher highs that others will never know this ecstasy of winning.  They will also never understand our agony of defeat the way that we do.  They can only sit on the sidelines and pretend to understand, but they never will.

Those of us who know this will just continue on with the roller coaster ride and try to manage it as much as possible.  When the time comes for us to get back on the competitive track, we will always strap ourselves in and go on the ride; Yes, just for the competitive thrill of it, because we are driven.  Vince Lombardi once said, “If you can’t accept losing, you can’t win.”  How true this is, and by the same token it does not mean that you have to like losing.  He also said, “It’s not whether you get knocked down, it’s whether you get up.”  We all get knocked down at some point in time, and we understand that we will get back up and be stronger the next time.

The difference between the others and us is that we win more than the people who just go through the motions.  The majority of you just expect to exist, not really trying, or having to win (or not lose).  Although we do lose sometimes and it can be very hard on us, we always bounce back, always ready for the next competition, ready to compete and win.  We do not give up; we are persistent.  This is what makes us who we are.  We are the people who go on to do great things in our lives, while the rest of you just exist.

We are the people who cure cancer.  We are the people who develop new technologies for mankind.  We are the people who solve the hard issues in business, government and life, which others do not even want to think about.

So, we will keep beating the majority of you that are just not driven like us.  To those people like us and to those things that challenge us everyday, we will tip our cap to you when you do beat us.  We will be ready for you when we meet again.

Level 0
- Zero vision or unaligned direction among leaders
- Virtually impossible to set goals and take action
- In general, team action waste resources
- It's unknown what work will be acceptable

Level 1
- Unclear vision and direction
- Action by teams could be in opposite directions
- Should know what is not the direction
- Difficult to do meaningful work
- Most likely not going to meet leadership expectations

Level 2
- Good enough vision to do meaningful work
- Most leadership expectations will be met
- Short projects and quick results are desirable
- Vision adjustment can take place

Level 3
- Clear vision is known and understood by leadership and teams
- Provides environment for quickest and best results
- Easy to meet leadership expectations
- Changes in business can easily lead to positive Vision alignment

Yes, you can have a VMM less than zero.  In the simple form of VMM the lowest level is a zero; However, in more complex instances, you can have a negative VMM.  Before we get into the explanation, let me emphasize that a zero level VMM has a core business function and either has no vision or direction at all, or is at least not communicated to the organization.
A negative VMM occurs when your organization is operating its core business under the premise that there is a vision for the organization and the perception is that employees are operating from that perceived vision.  When this happens over a period of time without proper communication of the organizations vision then operational separation may occur.  Operational separation is when the vision is so distorted over time that operational units that should be performing core task as a single unit, start operating as separate units. Since the definition of a Level 0 VMM is: no vision or direction of a current business state...when you have two "business states" because of operational separation and the organizations VMM is a Level 0 then this combination will result in a negative VMM.

There has been many articles and books written about taking charge and leading the way.  This is a respectful theme and has a lot of merits.  People that take the lead are usually looked upon as the leader.  So what's the big deal?  Why is this an important subject and why now?

The big deal is that you may be leading your team in the wrong direction without knowing it; This discussion is important because you may not realize that you are.

How can you tell if you and your team are on the right path?  Ask yourself these four simple questions:

1. Do I know exactly what the Vision of my organization is?
2. Are the Goals of my team aligned with this vision?
3. Can every Action that my team performs be tied to a specific goal and are the deliverables acceptable to an owner?
   
4. Are the Results that my team's producing directly contributing to the vision and goals of the organization?
   

If you can not answer all of these questions, then you need to quickly re-evaluate the path your are on.

In the past, I have had some very smart and experienced leaders tell me that although they are not sure of the vision of their organization, they should still keep moving forward by setting goals, taking action and producing results.  So I ask them the simple question: How do the results you produce tie back to the vision and goals of the company.  And of course the answer is that they didn't know, but they thought it did.  They thought they knew enough to effectively to move forward.  They assumed that the organization was a VMM level 2 when they were probably only at a level 1 or 0.

Here is the mistake that most of us are making.  We get frustrated with the communication that is coming from our leaders, the CEO's, the Boards, the Executives...and we take it upon ourselves to "carve our own path."  We get great results, based on our belief's, and feel good about it.  STOP IT NOW!  The results probably don't align with your companies vision. If they do then you just got lucky.

Get Vision, Get results!