Business and Investment Center

Give your mission statement another look during the planning process. Make certain that you fully understand the implied tasks of the mission statement. This gives you coordination points for activities that cross boundaries between staff functions. Ask these five key questions as a validity check:

1. What am I being asked to do in the mission statement that is not spelled out in the text?
2. Are there implications of those tasks that may or may not be fully understood and appreciated?
3. What resources are going to be implicated when the hidden tasks are brought to execution?
4. Have we coordinated those implied tasks among the management team?
5. Are we fully committed to the range of tasks?

Another reason to revisit the mission statement is to confirm your mission capability. That is defined as your ability to carry out the requirements. In the plan that means you must be able to hit the targets you are setting for the first year. Not only is mission capability a planning issue, it has leadership implications as well. Too often managers set targets, objectives, or goals that are beyond the capabilities of the management team. Test your reality by asking several hard questions. Start with the following six about your team and their ability to fulfill the mission:

1. Does my team have the management maturity to complete the mission?
2. Do they have the wisdom, experience, and judgment to be successful?
3. Are they willing to commit the time, energy, and effort to accomplish the mission?
4. Can they complete the mission or operational tasks being set within the time frames being established?
5. Are we giving the team the right tools and equipment to get the job done?
6. Will they have enough information to properly do their job in the spirit in which intended?

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Consider using customer survey information to find out more about your customers. The obvious information includes general characteristics that help divide the customers into segments. Do your customers divide into groups by age, income, or gender? By profession or educational level? By type of company or industry? This information can be extremely useful. However, you may need to filter information from questions that might encourage customers to give incorrect answers, such as questions about age, income level, and intent to buy.

Besides that, you also should consider the distribution channels. What are the standard channels of distribution for this customer segment? How are they different from other segments? This is especially important for product businesses marketing through channels, but in all cases you need to know where your customers go to satisfy the needs and requirements you’ve identified. Know the buying process for these target customers. What are the key decision factors? For example, some customers are more sensitive to price than others, some segments are more concerned about quality than price, and some care most about availability and convenience. In each case, those customers are willing to pay to realize the desired benefits.

Where do members of this segment go for information? What kinds of information will be most effective? Know where to send marketing communications, such as advertising and press releases, so that the right customers will find them. Know how to create those messages so that they will generate the right response. Look at complaints and problems as a valuable source of customer market information. Studies show that 2-4% of dissatisfied customers complain, which leaves 96-98% unaccounted for. Can you identify these other unhappy customers? By contacting them you may learn of a product problem, discover a solution to a problem, and/or repair and save customer relationship. Remember, if they are not talking to you, they may be complaining to your next potential customer.

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