7.2: Mission

A mission statement is a concise explanation of an organization’s core purpose, outlining what it does, who it serves, and how it delivers value on a daily basis. It focuses on the present by defining the organization’s goals, values, and primary activities. For leaders, having a clear mission statement is important because it provides direction for decision-making, ensures consistency in actions, and helps communicate expectations to both team members and stakeholders. It also strengthens organizational identity, keeps everyone aligned with common objectives, and fosters accountability, allowing leaders to guide their teams more effectively toward achieving their overall vision.²⁹

In working to turnaround Starbucks, Howard Schultz sought to renew Starbucks’s commitment to its mission statement: “to inspire and nurture the human spirit—one person, one cup and one neighborhood at a time.” A mission such as Starbucks’s states the reasons for an organization’s existence. Well-written mission statements effectively capture an organization’s identity and provide answers to the fundamental question “Who are we?” While a vision looks to the future, a mission captures the key elements of the organization’s past and present.

Company	Mission Statement
Harley Davidson	We ride with our customers and apply this deep connection in every market we serve to create superior value for all of our stakeholders.
Internal Revenue Service	Provide America’s taxpayers top-quality service by helping them understand and meet their tax responsibilities and enforce the law with integrity and fairness to all.
Starbucks	To inspire and nurture the human spirit – one person, one cup and one neighborhood at a time.
The Estée Lauder Company	Bringing the best to everyone we touch and being the best in everything we do.
Limited Brands	Limited Brands is committed to building a family of the world’s best fashion brands offering captivating customer experiences that drive long-term loyalty and deliver sustained growth for our shareholders.
Fender Musical Instruments	We will exceed the expectations of music enthusiasts worldwide and create a community for individual expression by focusing on our people, products, and business excellence.

Table 2 Missions. While a vision describes what an organization desires to become in the future, an organization’s mission is grounded in the past and present. A mission outlines the reasons for the organization’s existence and explains what role it plays in society. A well-written mission statement captures the organization’s identity and helps to answer the fundamental question of “Who are we?” As a practical matter, a mission statement explains to key stakeholders why they should support the organization.

The following examples illustrate the connections between organizations and the needs of their key stakeholders.

In order to prosper, organizations need support from their key stakeholders, such as employees, owners, suppliers, and customers. A mission statement should explain to stakeholders why they should support the organization by making clear what important role or purpose the organization plays in society. Google’s mission, for example, is “to organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful.” Google pursued this mission in its early days by developing a very popular Internet search engine. The firm continues to serve its mission through various strategic actions, including offering its Internet browser Google Chrome to the online community, providing free e-mail via its Gmail service, and making books available online for browsing.

Figure \(\PageIndex{1}\): Wikipedia Commons is licensed Public Domain

One of Abraham Lincoln’s best-known statements is that “a house divided against itself cannot stand.” This provides a helpful way of thinking about the relationship between vision and mission. Executives ask for trouble if their organization’s vision and mission are divided by emphasizing different domains. Some universities have fallen into this trap. Many large public universities were established in the late 1800s with missions that centered on educating citizens. As the twentieth century unfolded, however, creating scientific knowledge through research became increasingly important to these universities. Many university presidents responded by creating visions centered on building the scientific prestige of their schools. This created a dilemma for professors: should they devote most of their time and energy to teaching students (as the mission required) or on their research studies (as ambitious presidents demanded via their visions)? Some universities continue to struggle with this trade-off today and remain houses divided against themselves. In sum, an organization is more effective to the extent that its vision and its mission target employees’ effort in the same direction.³⁰

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²⁹Cartwright, G. (2026) (2026)

³⁰DesRoaches, K. (2022)