How to Find Time to Be the Visionary Your Business Needs

When you are a business owner or are running a business, you are always spinning a lot of plates. You are solving problems, putting out fires, overseeing work, and helping to sell products or services for your business. You are always multi-tasking and always problem solving. Do you take any time to operate in your most important role as a visionary for the company? You are the leader of your company, which means that you have to create and develop the vision that drives it.

Many times, when a business is started, business owners will develop the vision for the business, put it in the drawer of their desk and never look at it again. They never tell their team about it, they don’t incorporate it into their strategic plans, or if they do, they do not relate the plans to the “why” of what those plans are. How do these relate to your vision?

When you last looked at your vision and strategic plans, your vision may have been to sell “more,” to be recognized as a leader in your industry, or to be a leader in your trade association. None of these are what your vision really is. A real vision should be so real that you can see it. It needs to be written down in a way that will entice the best and the brightest to want to work with you to accomplish your vision along with you. Your best customers and suppliers want to work with you once they read it. It is really a Vivid Vision. As Cameron Herold described in his book, “Double Double,” having a Vivid Vision is the first step to doubling the size of your company. It is not meant to be a static piece of paper that is never reviewed or revised again. It should be something that is revised every three years, as your company is in a different spot now, with new opportunities, new products, a better team, more opportunities to participate in working with others in your community.

It is sometimes very difficult for you to find the time to prepare this vision with everything else that you have to do, but one route to get this done is to hire a great consultant with experience in capturing the vision of a business owner and can transmit that vision to paper in a way that captures your dream for the company and makes it seem real. The consultant can work with you for a day to get this done which will give you a document that you can be really excited about, and to help to make your team excited about the future of the company and their place in the company.

Once you have that vision on paper, many great business owners share it with their team (some will write it on their walls at their company, incorporate pieces of it on their website; and make it part of their new hire kits). They also incorporate it into management team meetings and the management team members share it with members of their team in their sector of the business. The vision will flow into your strategic plan and goals that you are also reviewing in your team meetings. It provides your “why” to all of your team members to show them where you are taking the company, so everyone is on the same page and shares your excitement.

Great business leaders will also share this Vivid Vision with their best customers and suppliers who may learn what an ideal customer looks like to you, whether the company may be looking to purchase other companies in the next three years, or by adding more product offerings. These customers and suppliers will be mindful of business opportunities that they may run across that will help your company grow.

While you are busy wearing multiple hats as a business owner, you cannot accomplish your goal if you don’t write it down and share it. You also cannot accomplish your vision all by yourself—it takes a team that is excited about the future with you.

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Denice Gierach

Gierach Law Firm

Denice Gierach is an attorney, CPA, Northwestern University business master's graduate, and has owned several businesses from real estate to manufacturing. She is the lead attorney at Gierach Law Firm in the Chicago area. With more than 30 years of experience, she has been a respected and sought-after resource for businesses looking to grow, sell, solve problems, and succeed long term. Her insights across business areas gives a fuller lens to business issues and solutions, and helps businesses grow and succeed with less time spent on legal issues and other time-consuming problems.

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