What is the difference between a mission, vision, and values?

Updated: June 20, 2023

Employees are often confused about mission, vision, and value statements. Here are just a few of the questions I'm frequently asked:

• What's the difference?

• What are they for?

• Do we even need them all?

These questions came up a lot while I was doing research for The Service Culture Handbook. They’ve also come up while training thousands of employees on mission, vision, and values.

Here's an explanation of the three concepts along how other statements fit in.

What are a company’s mission, vision, and values?

An organization's mission, vision, and values help communicate something about the culture to employees. They should help guide each employees’ daily work and decision-making.

You can understand the difference by thinking what, why, and how.

• Mission: What the company does.

• Vision: Why the company does it.

• Values: How the companies does it.

Here’s a video explainer:

What is a mission statement?

A mission statement broadly describes what the organization does. They can range from specific to broad. Some are only truly understood by employees.

Clio, a company that makes legal practice management software, has a fairly descriptive mission statement:

Osprey, a company that makes backpacks and other equipment to help people enjoy the outdoors, has a more abstract mission:

Despite taking different approaches, both mission statements succinctly tell employees what the organization does. These short, simple statements make it easier for employees to use the mission to guide their daily work.

What is a vision statement?

A vision statement describes why an organization exists. It often refers to a larger goal the company is relentlessly pursuing.

TriMet operates the public transportation system in Portland, Oregon. It's vision statement reads:

Compared to mission statements and values, fewer organizations have a vision statement. That’s because the mission statement often speaks to the company's reason for existing.

For instance, the JetBlue Airways mission statement is "Inspire Humanity." The company describes this mission as the reason the airline was founded:

What is a purpose statement?

A purpose statement combines elements of a mission and vision into one single statement that broadly describe what the company does and why.

Purpose statements give employees one fewer statement to memorize. That can simplify things a bit and make the purpose easier to follow.

Target’s purpose statement abstractly describes what it does (sells goods for everyday life) and how it tries to do it (helping families discover joy).

Value Statements

An organization’s values describe how its employees do business. They serve as guidelines for the types of behaviors that should be promoted and encouraged.

Rackspace, a company that provides cloud-based computer networks, shares explanations for each of its five core values to provide more context:

• Excellence. We are an accountable, disciplined, high-performing company with proven results.

• Customer-driven. We are proactive, collaborative and committed to success for our customers.

• Expertise. Rackers are passionate learners who are embedded in our customers’ businesses to provide unbiased solutions.

• Agility. We adopt new technologies and evolve services to meet customers where they are in their journey.

• Compassion. We’re one team doing the right thing for our customers, communities and each other.

Some companies, like Squarespace, put their values in priority order:

1. Be the customer.

2. Design is not a luxury.

3. Build the ideal.

4. Learn fast, act fast.

5. Protect creativity.

6. Simplify.

Where do other statements fit in?

Companies often have a myriad of other statements on top of their mission, vision, and values. These include mottos, slogans, and brand promises.

An informal LinkedIn poll revealed that nearly half of organizations have four or more statements that are used to guide employee behavior. Having too many statements for employees to remember can get confusing.

Whenever possible, it helps to simplify.

Regular readers know I often refer to a company's customer service vision statement, which is a shared definition of outstanding service that gets everyone on the same page.

In customer-focused organizations, the mission does double duty as the customer service vision, eliminating the need for a separate statement.

For example, JetBlue's Inspire Humanity mission tells employees what the company does (albeit very abstractly) and how they should treat customers.

Many companies have a separate brand promise or marketing slogan. That's okay, as long as the external statements are still aligned with the company's mission, vision, or values.

The Armstrong Garden Centers brand promise is "Gardening without Guesswork." This is a succinct and very natural external version of the company's mission statement:

We strive to take the guesswork out of gardening by providing horticultural expertise, exceptional service, and the best quality plants and products. We are passionate gardeners cultivating a welcoming environment for all to learn and be inspired.

Conclusion

Fewer statements are better than more statements. Simplify whenever possible. You want to provide clarity, not confusion.

Do you need help writing a mission, vision, or values? Here are some resources to help:

1. Write your mission: My free step-by-step guide

2. Build a service culture: The Service Culture Handbook

Five Mistakes Companies Make with Corporate Values

Advertising disclosure: This blog participates in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites.

Please excuse my language. I want to write this plainly.

Most corporate values are bullshit. 

In the majority of companies I observe, values are created via a meaningless corporate exercise. Employees are unaware of them, or if they are, the values do absolutely nothing to guide behavior.

The problem is values are misunderstood and misused. They are not just a set of fancy words to dream up and slap on your website. 

Listing "integrity" as a corporate value doesn't mean your employees will magically act with integrity. Enron, a company made famous for a massive accounting scandal that sent executives to prison, listed integrity among its core values. 

Here are five common mistakes companies make with corporate values, and how you can fix them.

Mistake #1: Executives write them

"We just wrote our values at a retreat," said the executive. "We're really excited about them, but I'm having trouble getting employees to buy-in."

Many leaders have shared this challenge with me.

Employees tend to have a pretty good bullshit meter. The values that leaders dream up while sequestered in a conference room at an executive retreat are frequently boilerplate corporate nonsense.

A 2004 study by Booz Allen and the Aspen Institute found the same themes in almost every company's list of values:

• 90 percent included integrity

• 88 percent included customer focus

• 78 percent included employee focus

The fix is simple. Make value writing a more inclusive process to get a broad range of perspectives in the room. Ask employees at all levels to help write values that actually have meaning.

You can use the same process I use to help companies write their customer service vision statement.

Mistake #2: They're not authentic

A friend lamented her company's new values over lunch one day. She and the rest of her executive team had just written them at an executive retreat, but something didn't feel right.

I asked her to tell me more about communication, which was one of the new values. "Oh, we suck at communication," she said. She explained “communication” had been added simply because it sounded good.

Employees can spot inauthentic values a mile away. 

Values should codify how people really act. Perhaps not all the time, but certainly when things are going well. They should describe actual behaviors, not wistful thinking about how people might act in some distant future.

When writing your corporate values, ask yourself, "Do we regularly do this now?" If the answer is no, then it's not really one of your organization's values.

Mistake #3: Nobody knows them

Let's try a test. 

Try to list your organization's values without looking them up. Now ask your boss, your employees, and your colleagues to do the same thing. See if people can consistently list all of the values.

Values can't guide behavior if they're unknown.

You can fix this by communicating the values repeatedly, using a wide variety of methods. One company I worked with went to great lengths to make sure everyone knew the corporate values:

• The values helped guide the recruiting process.

• They were introduced in new hire training.

• Leaders used the values as a guide when giving feedback.

• Values were part of the performance evaluation process.

• The CEO spoke about the values at quarterly all-hands meetings.

Mistake #4: They're undefined

A client once hired me to evaluate how its new corporate values were working. I conducted my study and then presented both good and bad news to the executive team.

The good news was 95 percent of employees could correctly identify all five corporate values. The remaining five percent got at least three out of five correct.

The bad news is nobody had any idea what the values actually meant. Even the executive team disagreed on their meaning.

One value was integrity.

• The CFO felt integrity meant you don't steal. 

• The CMO felt integrity meant you did the right thing for customers. 

• The CEO felt integrity meant you were a good member of the community.

None of these definitions were inherently bad. They were just different. Values can't consistently guide behavior if they don't have consistent definitions.

This problem can be fixed by attaching clear definitions to each value. 

When I work with companies on defining their culture, I ask leaders to tell stories about everyday behavior that aligns with the values. These stories help leaders communicate these values more effectively.

Mistake #5: They're not prioritized

Your employees will encounter tricky situations where one value comes into conflict with another. They could find themselves at an impasse if the values aren't prioritized.

Disney theme parks provide a great example. Here's how Disney's four values for theme park cast members are prioritized:

1. Safety

2. Courtesy

3. Show

4. Efficiency

I've seen a first-hand example of these prioritized values. Here's an excerpt from Getting Service Right, recounting an experience riding the Twilight Zone Tower of Terror ride:

Everyone had just belted into their seats when a young boy started crying and protesting that he didn't want to go on the scary ride. The cast member playing the "demented elevator operator" immediately broke out of his character and invited the boy to step off the ride. He assured the boy's concerned mother that he'd keep a close eye on her son while she enjoyed the ride. When we returned and the elevator doors opened, the cast member was waiting with the now-smiling boy standing next to him.

Disney's priorities clearly guided the cast member's actions. Safety is the first priority, and this was evident when he delayed the ride and made sure the boy exited safely. The second priority is courtesy, so the cast member momentarily paused his scripted routine to politely address the young boy and assure the mother her son would be safe. The show is Disney's third priority, so the cast member quickly resumed his act once the first two priorities were addressed.

Take Action

Corporate values don't have to be empty words.

They can become useful guides for hiring, training, and coaching employees. And when employees encounter an expected situation, strong values can help point them in the right direction.

Does Your Company Have Too Many Missions and Visions?

The vice president shared a draft of her company's new values project.

She had been working with two other executives to create them. They had come up with nine after several brainstorming sessions.

On paper, they looked good. These were solid, reasonable values that were all straight out of the corporate values catalog. Nothing controversial. 

There were two problems. 

The first issue was the company already had a lot of cultural artifacts. A cultural artifact is something that helps people understand your organization's culture, like a mission, vision, or set of values. 

This company already had a lot:

• Mission statement

• Service promise

• Service motto

• Brand tagline

Now, they were planning to introduce a new set of values on top of everything else. Which led to the second problem.

Some of those nine values weren't accurate. Communication was number three on the list. "Oh, we suck at communication!" said the vice president.

Perhaps you face a similar mess. Here's how you can untangle it.

Focus vs. Confusion

Companies' cultural artifacts frequently feel empty because organizations often have too many or the existing ones are inauthentic.

In the rush to create another tagline, motto, or corporate vision, nobody takes the time to decide what one statement is the most important or ensure all the artifacts are in alignment.

If everything is important, then nothing is important.

In The Service Culture Handbook, I related the story of a restaurant chain I worked with that had too many cultural artifacts.

It had a mission statement, a brand promise, a set of four service promises, and a list of 17 service standards that waitstaff were expected to follow with every guest.

Employees weren't quite sure which was most important. 

This was especially challenging since some of these cultural artifacts didn't clearly support each other. For instance, the mission statement described a desire to create amazing experiences while the service standards emphasized up-selling and efficiency.

At an executive retreat, I posed the question to the CEO, his executive team, and the general managers of each individual restaurant: which cultural artifact is most important?

There initially wasn't a consensus, but it led to a good discussion. The group finally agreed that the mission statement should be the primary guide for the employees. 

Next, they decided to rethink their existing cultural artifacts. Some were eliminated while others were simplified and aligned with the mission. The 17 service standards were slimmed down to 10. 

The restaurant chain's leadership team then communicated the revised artifacts to employees with a renewed emphasis on the mission.

Not surprisingly, service quality improved once employees had a consistent understanding of what outstanding service should be.

Where a Customer Service Vision Fits In

In customer-focused companies, the most important cultural artifact is a customer service vision.

A customer service vision is a shared definition of outstanding service that guides all employees' actions when it comes to serving customers.

What if your company already has some pretty important artifacts?

When my clients face this challenge, I usually suggest two options. Option one is to make one of your existing artifacts do double-duty as the customer service vision.

In many companies, the organization's mission, vision, or values is also the customer service vision. There's no need to add yet another statement to the mix!

For example, take a look at REI's mission statement:

At REI, we inspire, educate and outfit for a lifetime of outdoor adventure and stewardship.

This is why the company exists (hence, the mission), but it also paints a clear picture of what type of service employees should strive to provide. Go visit an REI location today and you'll almost certainly find enthusiastic retail associates who will try to help you enjoy the outdoors!

In some cases, none of my clients' existing cultural artifacts are particularly inspiring. (They decide this, not me.) That's when I suggest a second option: replace one of your existing artifacts with the new vision.

I recently helped a client do this and it was amazing how much the new vision energized employees.

Take the Three Question Test

Here's an easy way to tell if a cultural artifact is actually relevant.

Select one of your cultural artifacts (mission, vision, values, motto, tagline, etc.). Talk to a random sample of employees and ask them three questions about that artifact:

1. What is it?

2. What does it mean?

3. How does it guide the work that you do?

You can tell the artifact has virtually no meaning if employees aren't aware of it or can't give consistent or clear answers to those questions.

In customer-focused companies, every employee can give a consistent answer to the three questions when asked about the customer service vision.

You can learn more about customer service visions and how to create one here.