Organizational Vision and Visionary Organizations

Hoffman Edward , The Right to be Human: A Biography of Abraham Maslow (Los Angeles, CA: Jeremy P. Tarcher, Inc., 1988), p. 280.

David F. , “How Companies Define Their Mission,” Long Range Planning. Volume 22/1 (February 1989): 90–92.

We defined “leading companies” as those firms in the two Fortune 500 lists (Industrial and Service companies) for large corporations and the Inc. 500 (Private) and Inc. 100 (Public) lists for small ones. Since we didn't wish to survey all 1600 firms, we carefully selected a representative sample from each of these populations stratified by industry and size. From each of the two Fortune 500 lists, we selected a 50% sample. From the Inc. 500 list we selected approximately a 20% sample and from the Inc. 100 list we selected a 100% sample. Our total sample size was 700. The privately held companies which make up the Inc. 500 list are relatively unstable and thus were quite difficult to locate. Given this fact, we concluded that we should try to survey an equal number of privately held (Inc. 500) and publicly held (Inc. 100) small companies. After laborious search we tracked down 102 of the privately held small companies and included them in our sample. We were only able to survey 98 of the publicly held small companies because two of them were no longer in business.

Companies from each of the four sources of names responded at approximately the same rate (Fortune 500 Service, 22%; Fortune 500 Industrial, 23%; Inc. 500 Private, 27%; Inc. 100 Public, 25%). An analysis to determine if the responses received were representative of the sample drawn for each group yielded no significant biases in response patterns.

Schisgall Oscar , Eyes on Tomorrow: The Evolution of Proctor & Gamble (Chicago, IL: J.G. Ferguson Publishing Company, 1981), p. 260.

Watson Thomas J. Jr. , A Business and Its Beliefs (New York, NY: McGraw-Hill Book Company, Inc., 1963), pp. 4–5.

Watson Thomas J. Jr. , op. cit., pp. 13–14

Ibid.

DePree Max , Leadership is an Art (New York, NY: Doubleday Dell Publishing Group, Inc., 1989), pp. 4–80.

Foster Lawrence G. , A Company that Cares: One Hundred Year Illustrated History of Johnson & Johnson (New Brunswick, NJ: Johnson & Johnson Company, 1986), p. 108.

Petrakis Harry Mark , The Founder's Touch: The Life of Paul Galvin of Motorola (New York, NY: McGraw-Hill Book Company, 1965), p. 111.

Merck George W. , “An Essential Partnership—The Chemical Industry and Medicine,” speech presented to the Division of Medicinal Chemistry, American Chemical Society, April 22, 1935.

Bower Marvin , Perspective on McKinsey (New York, NY: McKinsey & Company, Inc., 1979), p. 234.

Schopf Cliff , Manager of Product Controls, Bechtel Corporation, San Francisco, 1990.

Boorstin Daniel J. , The Americans: The Democratic Experience (New York, NY: Vintage Books, 1974), p. 596.

Wal-Mart illustrates one crucial aspect of missions: A compelling mission, once achieved, must be followed by a new mission. This is imperative. It is a grave error to achieve a mission and not immediately set a new one. Failing to set new missions causes companies to flounder, drift, and wander aimlessly, which eventually produces internal malaise and poor overall performance. Trimble Vance H. , Sam Walton (New York, NY: Penguin Books USA, Inc., 1990), p. 306.

Boorstin Daniel J. , op. cit., p. 548.

Gibson P. , “Being Good Isn't Enough Anymore,” Forbes, November 26, 1979, p. 40.

Sculley John , Odyssey (New York, NY: Harper & Row Publishers, 1987), pp. 4–5.

Stalk G. Jr. , “Time—The Next Source of Competitive Advantage,” Harvard Business Review (July/August 1988), p. 44.

During a televised interview on ABC's “20/20” show on August 19, 1988, in a story on the “Sneaker Wars,” Nike CEO Phil Knight was asked if he knew the President of Reebok. Knight said, “Yes.” The interviewer then asked if he liked the President of Reebok. Knight replied, “No. And I don't want to like him.” A similar example comes from an anonymous board member of Nike who was interviewed by one of the authors in 1990; he remarked, “Our idea of a perfect day is to get up in the morning and throw rocks at our competitors.”

Collins James C. , “Passion Can Provide a Propelling Purpose,” San Jose Mercury News, August 7, 1988, p. PC 1.

Aldrich N. , “The Real Art of the Deal,” Inc. Magazine November 1988, p. 82.

Kennedy Donald , President, Stanford University, from a speech given to the Stanford University staff and faculty, April 7, 1990.

General Electric Company, The General Electric Story (Schenectady, NY: General Electric Company, 1989), p. 128.

Schisgall Oscar , op. cit., pp. 87–98.

Lacey Robert , Ford: The Men and the Machine (New York, NY: Ballantine Books, 1986), p. 93.

General Electric Company, op. cit., p. 128.

Schwettmann Fred Hewlett-Packard , from an interview with one of the authors, 1990.