Transformational Leadership: Importance of Mission and Vision Statements in Organizational Change

This article discusses the significance of mission and vision statements in organizational change and how transformational leadership can help. It explores the mission and vision statements of Apple Inc. and the Blue Ocean Shift Strategy. The article also highlights the importance of investors' confidence in organizational changes.

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Slide 2
Mission Statement is very important for a company to express the purpose of the
company to the investors and the customers. The company has various purposes that it aims to
fulfill. These aims include the internal organizational aims and the external objectives. Therefore
the mission statement must be devised in a way that the company’s objectives are expressed in a
balanced manner (Rajasekar, 2013). The investors looks closely towards the mission statement of
a company so that they know that the amount of money invested is in a company that has a
proper objective to proceed ahead.
With the shift in strategic thinking of an organization the company is also expected to
change the mission statement to be in sync with the changed objectives. The company must look
for a long term purpose that needs to be fulfilled and then form the mission statement so that the
same is reflected. The mission statement is usually the company’s details in a short statement.
Slide 3
During the time of Steve Jobs the mission statement of Apple was “Man is the creator of
change in this world. As such, he should be above systems and structures, and not subordinate
to them.” The mission statement of Apple has gone through a lot of changes with the years.
Another mission statement that was used was “To make a contribution to the world by making
tools for the mind that advance humankind.” Steve Jobs was a business visionary and he had
personally taken care of the company becoming immensely successful. The company is presently
having Tim Cook as the CEO and present mission statement of the company is “Apple designs
Macs, the best personal computers in the world, along with OS X, iLife, iWork and
professional software. Apple leads the digital music revolution with its iPods and iTunes

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online store. Apple has reinvented the mobile phone with its revolutionary iPhone and App
store, and is defining the future of mobile media and computing devices with iPad”
(Apple.com, 2018)
Slide 4
Vision statement is broader than the mission statement of a company. The vision
statement includes the values of the company and this is even broader than the mission
statement. The vision statements is the reflection of the philosophy of the company and its
position about various commercial as well as social issues (Taiwo, Agwu & Lawal, 2016).
It is important for many of the investors to see that the vision of the company is in sync
with their own strategic vision. Often the mission and vision combines to form the strategy of the
company. The strategy is the short term actions taken to fulfill the long term mission and vision
of the company (Kirkpatrick, 2017). The employees and the higher management often refer to
the vision of the company for their actions and plan of actions. It is the vision of the company
that holds the large Multinational Companies as one single entity throughout the world.
Slide 5
The present Vision Statement of Apple is as follows “We believe that we are on the face
of the earth to make great products and that’s not changing. We are constantly focusing on
innovating. We believe in the simple not the complex. We believe that we need to own and
control the primary technologies behind the products that we make, and participate only in
markets where we can make a significant contribution. We believe in saying no to thousands
of projects, so that we can really focus on the few that are truly important and meaningful to
us. We believe in deep collaboration and cross-pollination of our groups, which allow us to

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innovate in a way that others cannot. And frankly, we don’t settle for anything less than
excellence in every group in the company, and we have the self-honesty to admit when we’re
wrong and the courage to change. And I think regardless of who is in what job those values
are so embedded in this company that Apple will do extremely well.”
The present mission and vision statement of Apple Inc. has often been criticized for being
too long and not like traditional mission and vision statement of the different companies. Many
people have criticized the mission and vision statement as being cliché and not according to the
mission and vision statement structures that is internationally followed. The statements are too
long and descriptive. However Apple is known for breaking the traditional barriers and going
beyond what is generally adopted by conformists.
Slide 6
Blue Ocean Shift Strategy was first devised in a book of the same name in which the
following step by step change in organizational management. The steps are, Step 1 Get Started-
Step 2 Understand where you are, Step 3 Imagine where you could be, Step 4 Find how you get
there, Step 5 Make your move (Strategy, 2015). This is not only true in terms of organizations
but also in the individual people’s lives where one is intending to bring the desired changes. The
particular theory of organizational change is effective in measurably making moves towards the
place where the company wants to see itself in a particular period of time (Agnihotri, 2016).
However the investors must be in confidence before organizational changes are initiated through
the process of blue ocean strategy. The investors look at various perspectives such as whether the
organization is capable of implementing the changes effectively or it will be a failure.
Slide 7

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Apple is one of the most reputed and respectable companies among the companies in its
genre. The customers of Apple Inc. has tremendous faith on the company. It is seen every time
that the company launches a new product the customers queue up in the stores over night to
acquire the product. Therefore the investors may look at the past history of the company and its
trends in performance. Apple’s success is often held as examples to be followed and Apple’s
constant change and innovation in the organization is one of the reason behind its success.

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Reference:
Agnihotri, A. (2016). Extending boundaries of blue ocean strategy. Journal of Strategic
Marketing, 24(6), 519-528.
Apple.com. (2018). Business. Retrieved from https://www.apple.com/business/
Kirkpatrick, S. A. (2017). Toward a Grounded Theory: A Qualitative Study of Vision Statement
Development. Journal of Management Policy and Practice, 18(1), 87-101.
Rajasekar, J. (2013). A comparative analysis of mission statement content and
readability. Journal of Management Policy and Practice, 14(6), 131-147.
Strategy, B. O. (2015). Blue Ocean Strategy. Marketing, 1009, 4C.
Taiwo, A. A., Agwu, M. E., & Lawal, F. A. (2016). Vision and Mission in Organization: Myth
or Heuristic Device?. The International Journal Of Business & Management, 4(3), 127.