Components of Organizational Mission Statements

This paper presents ideas to aid strategists in developing more effective organizational mission statements. Well-crafted mission statements are generally considered vital to the effective conduct of the strategic management process (strategic analysis, strategy formulation, strategy implementation, strategy assessment). While the reasons for mission statements have been studied and generally agreed on, less so are the explicit components to be included in the mission statement. In this paper a framework of six components is presented that may be applied in developing the content of the mission statement. A case study of an existing firm's organizational mission is employed in the identification of the six components.