What's Your Mission?

Gandhi once said, "A small body of determined spirits, fired by an unquenchable faith in their mission, can alter the course of history." Gandhi and his followers certainly did just that, as have many others who took a mission to heart.

In the 1980 movie, The Blues Brothers, Jake and Elwood Blues are men on a mission. They experience a revelation and decide they must get their old band back together in order to earn enough money to save the Catholic boarding school where they were raised. Not quite as grand a mission as Gandhi's, no doubt, but a mission just the same.

Chances are, your company has a mission, too, with an accompanying mission statement, carefully crafted and culled to provide optimal guidance in the decisions you make as an organization.

But what about you personally? What's your mission? What drives your own personal decisions? Your career, aspirations, and dreams? What prism do you use to focus your thoughts and cast light on the choices you face at work, at home, and in the world?

Experts like Dr. Stephen Covey advocate the need for a personal mission statement to guide the decisions that affect your own life and career. Just as successful companies use mission statements to clarify and filter their organizational decisions, many successful individuals do the same on a personal level, as well.

FranklinCovey has put together an online Mission Statement Builder to help you create a personal mission statement for yourself, your family, and your team. I recommend checking it out and giving it a try.

As you begin filtering your day-to-day decisions through a personal mission statement, you may be surprised to find that reaching your goals becomes easier.