WHAT IS YOUR MISSION ? (November 1998)
Jeff Garbutt and John Brant

Do we really know what we are trying to achieve ? Or are we just aimlessly just trying to do our best for Square Dancing ?

Many organisations have faced very similar questions about their existence:
" Why do they exist ? (Mission statement)
" What is the ultimate goal they wish to achieve ? (Vision statement), and
" How do we inspire everyone towards that goal ? (Passion statement).

Can we use the same concepts in our quest to promote square dancing ? I believe so !

MISSION STATEMENT

Mission statements tell us what an organisation does, and why they exist. But more than that - they should inspire the people within that organisation to work towards their mission. In the case of my local caller's association it's main reason for existence is to provide a forum for the exchange of ideas and skills between callers for the overall good of square dancing. So our mission statement would be something like "to assist our callers to better serve the square dance community".

VISION

Vision statements are quite simply a view of how we would like things to be. In our case it could be something as simple as: "A world in which square dancing is seen as the most popular past-time."

PASSION STATEMENTS:

The term "passion statement" is quite new, but passion statements have been around for a long time. They are essentially "mission statements" that really say something - and are used to not only inspire the members of an organisation - but to encourage customers to use a product or service.
For example the old classic - "American Express Card - don't go anywhere without it". In Australia we have a petroleum company that says: "Go well - go Shell". And Coca-Cola used to have "things go better with Coca-Cola". These are statements that work on our sub-conscious and make us want to use that product.

So what is our passion statement? Well I suppose there is the old faithful "Square Dancing is Fun & friendship set to music". Or another one I've seen is "Square Dancing is cool". If we could just find a really good passion statement that catches everyone's attention - we might just pique their curiosity a bit. 

WHY BOTHER ?

Why should we bother to work on any of these you say. We are not a large corporation - we are just a hobby.

Well do you really care about this hobby ? Wouldn't you like to see it grow and become popular ? Don't you think it would be useful for us to work out exactly what we are trying to achieve (mission) ? And what we want the world to be like in five, ten, fifty or even one hundred years time ? Wouldn't you like to see Square Dancing as being a major part of that future (vision) ?

I know I do - and so should everyone who cares about square dancing.

Of course these statements on their own won't do anything. We also need action, training, planning, promotion, opportunity, good leaders, members and other resources. But what good are all these resources if they are aimlessly wandering around with nowhere to go ?