5 Steps To Write Your Mission Statement

A mission statement provides a compass and a decision-making framework so you can make decisions that align with your core values. It helps you be more purposeful and intentional with how you spend your time and energy. A result is that you can have a greater influence and impact on others.

This podcast series walks you through the five steps of writing and living out your mission statement.

Before you begin, gather a notebook and pen or pencil so you can complete the exercises as you listen. You will also find helpful handouts linked below that correspond to the steps in the process.

If you have a question or want to share your discoveries, please let me know! You can leave me a message here. If you want help walking through this process, schedule a free coffee chat to talk about how coaching might be helpful in this process.

Try to slow down and avoid rushing through the steps of the process. It can take awhile to develop your mission statement. My initial goal was to develop a draft of my mission statement that I could refine as I lived it out. Over the years, I have tweaked it as needed.

Step 1: Understanding The Difference Between A Mission And A Vision Statement

You can download the Mission Statement Workbook and print the pages for all five steps below, or you can download the files associated with each step as you go.

Step 2: Define Your Vision

In the second step, we'll look at identifying your dreams and defining your end goal. As Stephen Covey said, you should start with the end in mind.

Step 3: Define Your Mission

Now that you have identified your vision or what you want to accomplish, we'll take a look at writing your mission statement or how you will carry out your vision. 

In this step, we'll walk through three exercises to help you write your mission statement.

• Core values
• Unique characteristics
• Motivators

Then, we'll talk about how to write your mission statement and some guidelines to help you through the process.

Step 4: Visualize Results

A paper published by a Duke University researcher in 2006 found that more than 40% of the actions people perform each day weren’t actual decisions but rituals and habits.

In the fourth step of the process, we'll work through an exercise to help you visualize living out your vision and mission statements. 

Step 5: Perform a SWOT Analysis

Now that you have your vision and mission statements, it helps to perform a SWOT analysis (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats). In this episode, we'll walk through each of these steps.