Mission & Values
Mission is what you promise to your customers and Values is what you promise to your people.
Mission and Values sounds too old school to you? Name it anyway you want — “The why”, “Sense”, “Culture”, “Vision”, etc.
Mission
We recommend to settle down with the business model first and then come up with a mission. You need to understand what you sell before you actually make any promises.
There are companies that clearly state the mission, there are those that don’t, e.g. Apple. They show their promise on the product feedback page and that’s it.
Apple strives to bring the best personal computing experience to students, educators, creative professionals, and consumers around the world through its innovative hardware, software, and internet offerings. Apple welcomes your feedback on its products. Begin by selecting a product below.
Make a promise in any form and keep your word.
Values
Values are the rules. Yeah, they are those intangible boundaries that everyone in the company strives to respect. Or not. It may be easy not to stick to the values, but your job is to set them up in a way that fights back any tries to break them. Values are the most critical balancers of your company’s society and culture. They should show what you promote for and what you lay off for.
E.g. if you value Simplicity and someone regularly delivers overcomplicated results — they shouldn’t be with you in the long term. Otherwise your best talent will be upset that your values are not valued and may leave eventually.
You should find passion in the values of the following companies: