Discovering the tools that assist with developing a personal mission statement relieves a lot of pressure. There are guidelines and wizards that help you place proper emphasis on priorities in your life. In this article, I will point you to two online tools, and one that is for people who are analog, not digital.
The first tool, for the paper based is at Quintessential Careers and includes a five step plan to writing your personal mission statement. The process begins with “Identify past successes” and ends with “Write Mission Statement.” Don’t worry, they walk you through the steps and explain each as you progress.
The two main digital resources are from familiar names: Franklin Covey and Nightingale Conant. Each has an online mission builder that walks you through each step in developing your statement. They require a free registration to begin, but it is painless.
The Nightingale Conant wizard is pretty simple with just three pages to fill in, then it generates a personal mission statement. It can be edited, if you wish, and is fairly straight forward. If you remember from an earlier article, Nightingale Conant is one that defines your mission statement with mid-term goals. You’ll see this from the statement generated by my entries.
Your Mission Statement :
My purpose is to express my willingness to instruct, willingness to believe and willingness to reinforce by a commitment to MotR, by a commitment to God and by a commitment to inspire others to begin a technology consulting business, see my granddaughter once a month, see MotR double in downloads and obtain at least $XXX by Tuesday, September 25, 2007.
As you can see, it takes your answers and mashes them all together into a single statement, but it is a beginning for this exercise. With better punctuation, it would be easier to understand, but this is the raw file from NC.
Franklin Covey takes a slightly different approach to the process. It is a timed response to specific questions. You have a certain amount of time to read the question and respond in writing. Slow typists need to be aware of this. The wizard only works in Internet Explorer, so Firefox, Safari, and Opera users, be aware.
Defining values is the beginning for Franklin Covey. For some, this will be extremely difficult. The question pops up and you have to type the first thing that comes to mind. Sometimes, a big blank comes to my mind. Tough tough tough!
Once complete, it emails your statement to the email address you supplied in registration, so use one you can access. My mission statement from them is made up of a dozen or so “I will” statements. Because it is built on values, not goals, the generated mission statement is more personal.
Did I say this was tough?
Now go try these for yourself and let me know what you think and if appropriate, include your mission statement for others to learn from.
[tags]Franklin Covey, Nightingale Conant, Quintessential Careers, personal mission statement, leadership, motivation[/tags]
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4 responses so far ↓
1 Dave J. (64 comments.) // Sep 27, 2006 at 9:40 pm
Did the FC tool…both the kickstart and journey versions. Wrote some interesting stuff about myself, but not sure if I’ve found my mission statement. They don’t really ask ‘what I want’ in a practical way. I can see how hard this is now.
2 Larry Hendrick // Sep 27, 2006 at 10:18 pm
That fits my findings, but after doing several of the exercises, I think I’m getting a handle on what it is and how to do something substantial for myself.
I’m going to write about that as soon as time allows.
3 B.J. Freeman // Jan 3, 2007 at 4:44 am
Thanks for the advice. I will try them today.
4 Larry Hendrick // Jan 3, 2007 at 5:57 am
You’re welcome B.J. Let me know what you discover and how the tools work.
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