There are things that take time, are difficult but when completed, actually deliver more than you expect. A collective ambition is one of those quests that gets you more than you’ve asked for.
A collective ambition is more than just a collection of nice sentences, more than the regular “mission, vision, values” craftwork. It’s a structured, complete, down to earth picture of what and who you really are.
It builds on the need to clearly structure the core fundamentals of your team or organization, so you know where you belong and why you’re there. It frames a collective perception of what bounds different human beings together and why they work hard, besides the difficulties and problems. It clarifies what to choose when push comes to shove and what to fight for when in doubt.
As you may imagine, it’s not that easy to accomplish and certainly is not done in a heartbeat. You need to commit and endure the quest for answers over questions that sometimes you really don’t want to ask.
But what is a collective ambition really? Douglas Ready, from the MIT Sloan School of Management and creator of this tremendous concept, defines collective ambition as a compass that establishes what you are, where you’re going and what you take with you on that journey. A collective ambition contains the following components:
- Purpose, or the reason for being, why a group exists;
- Vision, or the big goals the group wants to accomplish, the aspiration of what it wants to achieve. It must be founded in tangible targets that clearly anchor the aspirations in objective accomplishments;
- Priorities, or the things, either operational or strategical, that the group needs to focus on in order to achieve the vision tangible targets. It could be what to do differently, what not to do, what to do more off or what do to less off. Regardless, it must state clearly and objectively the means by which the vision will be achieved.
- Promises, or what the group promises to all stakeholders, internal or external, while pursuing the vision and focusing on the priorities;
- Principles, or values that are the cornerstone of the group behavior and which are unbreakable;
- Behaviors, or how each group member must act while executing the priorities and fulfilling the promises made.
Think of it as an actual compass that contains all the elements working together to guide you on your quest for greatness:
This foundation gives you a concise, clear, straight forward picture of all that is fundamental for your group or organization. And it actually drives itself into making it public, transparent and, above all, alive. This is a foundation that permeates the organization and makes itself a vital piece of everyday life, prompting you to take the necessary actions to bring it to life and make it be revisited constantly, not only to disseminate what is relevant, but also to improve it and make it sounder and better.
So, why should you invest in such an endeavor?
- Clarification. The collective ambition acts as a lens that sharpens the overall perception of the whys, the hows and the whats that are relevant for the organization. This clarification is vital to eliminate grey areas, doubtful positions and unspoken rules. Therefore, your organization becomes transparent, confident and truly engaged.
- Guidance. As you clearly define the targets, the priorities and the behaviors, this immediately translates into self-contained, concise guidance of all daily activities. You can rely on a common, well defined set of guidelines that binds all to a given path and precise focus.
- Awareness. This foundation provides a heightened sense of orientation, status and expected performance. As this is shared across the organization, the awareness is global and automatically aligns all with the reality and what needs to be done to reach the target.
- Induction. By building a collective foundation, you automatically create a powerful induction mechanism that serves not only to align who is aware but also to rapidly incept those that come in contact with the organization. Thus, you automatically have an enormous power to attract and retain talent that otherwise would look elsewhere for a clearer guidance and purpose.
The level of engagement, communication and participation you get from the organization with this foundation is truly relevant. Besides becoming smarter, self-guided, clear and concise, you actually are able to drive a tremendous momentum with your talent base, besides deriving a full set of subsequent activities, fully justified by the targets you want to achieve.
And, as Douglas Ready puts it, if you want to build a game-changing organization, then you need to align people, purpose and performance. That’s why you need to work on your collective ambition.
