When a company seeks to define and attain its goals, a mission statement is often at the heart of that effort. The concept may sound simple, but summing up the essence of a complex organization requires careful planning and thought. Nowhere in corporate life, it can be argued, does language have such potential power.

“A mission statement must be consistent with the image that the public, customers, and employees have of the organization,” says Emerson Smith, president of Metromark Market Research, a strategic planning firm in Columbia, S.C. “It is dangerous for a company to create a grandiose statement that is seen by key audiences as inconsistent with their experience with the organization.”

Creating a successful mission statement usually begins with top management agreeing on the need to define their company or organization. Mission statements can be as short as a single phrase (“The customer always comes first”) or as long as a pamphlet containing details about the responsibilities of different departments and individuals.

When Iapyx Medical, a San Diego — based biomedical engineering company, shifted its focus to developing innovative devices that address hospital-acquired infections, management determined that a new mission statement would facilitate the rebranding. “We began with a series of meetings, including the heads of marketing and operations,” recalls Chris Whelan, vice president of marketing at Iapyx.

The group determined that the company’s mission statement must be clearly understood and state what the company does. “Mission statements are only as good as their relevant operational objectives,” Whelan notes.

The team boiled the essence of the company down to one, easy-to-memorize paragraph: “The Iapyx Medical Corporate Mission is to develop and manufacture innovative medical devices designed to address the epidemic of hospital-acquired infections and protect healthcare workers and patients from the risks of infections and device-related complications. We believe that the heart of good medical device design understands the users, the environment in which they work, and the diseases being addressed.”

Put It on Display
Many companies proudly frame their mission statement for all to admire. A major medical center in the South displayed its revised mission statement at the main entrance, to reflect a more engaged and enlightened social role. The original mission was defined “to improve the health status of our community.” The revised statement pledged “to improve the quality of delivery and access to health care in the community.”

For corporations, successful mission statements can directly impact the bottom line. Wal-Mart, Ford, and Apple Computers, for example, have used such statements to sustain worker morale and define and unify sprawling corporate empires.

Many mission statements also acknowledge the importance of the general public to the well-being of the company. Syms Clothing of New York uses its flattering mission statement — “An educated consumer is our best customer” — as a key part of its integrated marketing communications strategy. In a similar fashion, the Gallo Brothers of California won over a new generation of customers when it subtly boosted the perception of its mass-market wines by declaring, “We will serve no wine before its time.”

Live Your Mission
A mission statement can serve multiple functions. When Tom Petro became president of Fox Chase Bank in Philadelphia, he inherited an old mainline institution that had low internal morale and a tarnished public reputation. “We needed a unifying concept to cut through the confusion,” he recalls. “We needed to refocus employee energy and restore confidence of people who work and bank here.”

After months of thought, Petro came up with a simple statement: “Create satisfied customers.” “It sounds simple, but it’s not,” Petro says. “It is foundational, showing what the organization is all about.”

But for all the good they can do, mission statements are not a panacea. “A mission statement should not be a flamboyant change tool,” notes Kerry Patterson, chief development officer for VitalSmarts LLC, a corporate training firm in Provo, Utah. “It should offer a common vocabulary, a consistent message. And it needs to ring true. Troubled companies may try to use mission statements as Band-Aids, and it doesn’t work.”

Most important, perhaps, is that those who frame the mission statement believe in it. “If a CEO presents a mission statement but then doesn’t buy into it, it sends a terrible message,” says one corporate adviser. “The mission statement should be a way of life within the organization.”

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