The ONE Dream™
Most organizations have been through “Mission, Vision and Values” workshops and consulting projects. For many, the creation of a Mission Statement is a ritual experience that one must undergo as a sort of corporate rite of passage. We do this because it has become the norm and because it is familiar—everyone does it!
But...
- Few people can articulate the Mission Statement of their organization... and if you can’t remember it, how can you live it?
- Mission Statements tend to be created by committees who attempt to meet the needs of all constituents – can you imagine Apple going through this kind of bureaucratic, committee process?
- If we gathered all the Mission Statements from a sample group of organizations and redistributed them randomly, most would probably not be able to tell if the one they received was their own or not. That’s because Mission Statements tend to have a bland sameness about them—change chocolate factory to cheese factory, and, Voila!—you have your new Mission Statement.
We are in a new era in which people want something more inspiring than a Mission Statement—something that gathers the energy of organizations into a compelling, exciting and energizing future, and this does not fit easily under the heading of “mission, vision, and values”. A much larger container is needed to hold a magnificent idea—we need a dream. We need a new way of positioning businesses so that corporations can restore their tarnished image in our society.
Over thirty years at The Secretan Center, we have discovered that the common, unifying experience among winning teams, great endeavors and extraordinary achievements— is a dream. A dream is the uniqueness that can be found in groups of people who achieve the extraordinary—creating revolutions, overthrowing despots, founding nations (or fusing them into one), climbing Everest, reinventing organizations, creating breakthroughs, building something extraordinary or changing the way we live or think or how the world works. It is true of organizations, sports teams, film crews, orchestras, states, cities, countries—and families.
What we are really discussing here is passion and whether or not organizations today are able to ignite the necessary passion in their employees and customers that will fuel the accomplishment of something extraordinary—such as a dream. Not a five percent increase in market share or a ten percent return on equity, or “exceeding customer needs”—but a bold, daring, impudent, audacious, outrageous, thrilling, exhilarating and inspiring dream.
Great historical leaders—Christ, Buddha, Lao-Tzu, Confucius, Mohammed, Nelson Mandela, Mother Teresa, Martin Luther King, Jr., among them—all had a dream. In his famous speech delivered on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington D.C. on August 28, 1963, Martin Luther King repeated “I have a dream...” eight times. It was his ability to articulate his dream that united thousands of people and inspired them to usher in a new era in civil rights and liberties.
Dreams are like that—they have the power within them to change the world.
Case Studies
In order to understand the power of modern leadership to transform clients, organizations, communities, countries or the world, we must understand and harness the power of the dream.
 We begin by defining the process: there are three stages: 1) Identifying the dream, 2) realizing the dream, and 3) sustaining the dream. We invite leaders to first identify, then believe in the dream, to assume that the dream is realizable and assume that when the energies of their entire  organization are harnessed behind that dream, it will be achieved. An organization with 10,000 employees—and a dream—and who harnesses the combined energy of every employee behind that dream, creates the opportunity to achieve it!
 It is remarkable what happens when leaders are invited to focus on describing a dream, when they identify their most extraordinary, outrageous, never-before-achieved aspirations, when they are fearless and imaginative, thinking outside the box, being truly outrageous and extraordinarily creative. Leaders among our clients  have come up with some remarkable ideas—hospitals who dream of eliminating all avoidable deaths, banks who dream of changing the world, corporations who dream of becoming champions of the environment, communities who dream of becoming world-class centers of excellence and innovation, insurance companies who dream of making the  world more healthy, cities who dream of becoming the idea capital of the world and states who want to be a magnet for the world. Humana Inc. (73 on Fortune’s 100 List) found the power of the ONE Dream® we designed for them to be so extraordinary and transformational, that they helped to underwrite the same process for the city in which they are headquartered—Louisville, Kentucky.
The Process
The Secretan Center has developed a breakthrough system that invites leaders to identify, realize and sustain their dreams—their most extraordinary, outrageous, never-before-achieved aspirations. We ask them to be fearless and imaginative, to be outrageous and extraordinarily creative. We call it the ONE Dream™ Process.
Many people have subjective views about what an ambitious corporate aspiration should look like. But it is dangerous to make such momentous decisions on the basis of “hunch”, prejudice, bias or majority vote. Many leadership decisions—across sectors and issues—are made largely by intuition, or “gut instinct”. They are, in the end, intelligently derived “best guesses”. Leaders will then use tools such as traditional market research and the opinions of those around them to validate their best guesses, even though these methods are often demonstrably flawed.
Scientific Intelligence, a unique research methodology, operates on the principle of being able to identify the “Permission Space” that supports the ONE Dream® leading to a sound and rigorously determined plan for change. Based on recent advances in the behavioral sciences, holography and logic/mathematics, Scientific Intelligence’s formula for enabling organizations to identify the “permission space” is designed to uncover:
- A clear picture of the energy that is freely available from all relevant constituencies, which can be used to support and power the ONE Dream®.
- A deep and certain understanding of marketplace needs
- Comprehensive yet focused planning based on marketplace insights
- Successful and sustainable implementation
- A clear picture of activities and lines of business or strategies that should be terminated because there is no “permission space” for them
Using proprietary new research methodology, Scientific Intelligence identifies this “permission space”—quite literally the core “DNA” of an issue, and therefore the platform upon which the ONE Dream® can rest—and the key drivers of success that will propel the organization towards that ONE Dream®.
The most distinct advantage of the Scientific Intelligence process is its ability to bypass the unconscious filters that often lead respondents to give false or skewed answers. This methodology works on the principle that the public mind has a very specific but largely invisible “belief structure”, composed of paths and key “stations”, much like the neural structure of the brain. This belief structure accounts for why certain ideas, brands and products experience unexpected success—whereas others fail to capture the public’s imagination. Understanding and utilizing that belief structure is the only consistent and reliable way to influence public opinion. This methodology has been used successfully with corporations, jurisdictions and institutions across North America.
The Benefits of ONE Dream®
The magic of having ONE Dream® is remarkable:
- Possible successful strategies are revealed by accessing the appropriate energy that will support a dream, or in some cases, validate an existing strategy
- Internal and external languaging and messaging is dramatically simplified and clarified—there is only ONE Dream® and this removes confusion and competing marketing messages
- Many buzz-words and jargon-loaded slogans, tag-lines and marketing themes dissolve in the presence of ONE Dream®
- Processes become much simpler —the organization does what it takes to realize and sustain the ONE Dream®
- The entire organization becomes focused around a richly imagined future, that harnesses ALL the energy of ALL the constituents—internal and external—behind the attainment of the ONE Dream®. This results in greater internal alignment and employee inspiration
- Leaders share an inspiring story and use it to market, recruit, persuade, inspire, build, grow and excel
- The “buzz” around the ONE Dream® excites new opportunities, retains and inspires existing associates, builds new business opportunities and enables the organization to manage their destiny and informs all strategic initiatives. It galvanizes the organization.
The central philosophy that powers this process is our belief in dreams to inspire organizations and their stakeholders to outstanding performance. Modern organizations have forgotten how to dream and instead have adopted stale and dry Mission, Vision and Values Statements. Mission statements may not arouse passion, but dreams (and the expectation that they can be realized) do. All great organizations have dreams—think Starbucks, Southwest Airlines, Patagonia, Mountain Equipment Co-op, Genetech, W. L. Gore or Four Season’s Hotels. If an organization aligns its entire cultural architecture and energy behind the realization of ONE Dream®, breakthrough results—big dreams—can happen for people, customers, the organization and the community. When every employee aligns behind ONE Dream®, wonderful things happen!
For more information, please contact us at info@secretan.com or call us at 519-927-5213. |
