How to craft a vivid vision that aligns your team around a shared future

Executive overview

Most CEOs trying to define their company's future get stuck in the "how" — strategy, plans, metrics — instead of describing the destination. A vivid vision is a 3-year written description of what the company looks, feels, and acts like in the future, written as if you're already there.

Cameron Herold and Jennifer Hude (CEO of Vision Driven) discuss how to write a vivid vision, the most common mistakes CEOs make, and how to roll it out to align employees, customers, and suppliers.

The leader sets the vision unilaterally — then invites others to join or leave.

What a vivid vision is and isn't

• It's a 3-year description of the finished state, not a business plan or strategy document
• Write as if you've time-travelled to the future and are walking around describing what you see
• The airline analogy: you can't plot a route until you've entered the destination
• Without a clear destination, there are infinite "hows" — you loop and lose momentum
• CEOs often mistake mind-dump drafts for finished documents; most arrive at Vision Driven with work that isn't ready to share

Common mistakes CEOs make

• Getting caught in the "how" instead of describing the what
• Being too vague: "Our culture is awesome" is not a vivid vision
• Staying too metrics-driven without painting the picture
• Including strategy instead of destination
• Sitting in indecision mid-process — the biggest cause of timeline delays

What "vivid" actually means

• Replace generalities with specifics: instead of "we're crushing it", describe the team having lunch together four days a week because they want to
• Ask: "How will we know if we're both in that vision right now?"
• Tangible examples: team members are self-leaders, proactively investing in their own development; company sends them to workshops to level up skills and mindset
• Culture is one of 12 sections Vision Driven covers; it's among the most commonly underdeveloped

Whether to involve the leadership team

• The CEO should write the vivid vision, not co-create it by committee
• Steve Jobs didn't poll his team before removing the keyboard from the iPhone — if he had, they'd have demanded one
• Group input waters the vision down into a "kumbaya group hug"
• The leader's job is to set a direction bold enough that some people will choose to leave
• Example: Dean Gagnon rolled out a vivid vision to 85 employees; told the 15% who didn't like it to quit (offered $3,000 severance) — within a year, the company ranked #2 best place to work in Canada
• For hired-gun CEOs brought in by a PE firm or founder: still your job to own the vision

The cost of not doing it

• A CEO who delayed six months lost two senior leaders; both left citing lack of clarity on the company's direction
• The cost isn't the $6,500 fee — it's the COI (cost of inaction): scattered employees, misaligned suppliers, missed recruiting
• The vivid vision is an alignment tool for employees, customers, suppliers, and potential hires — not a five-page copywriting exercise

Timeline and pricing

• Vision Driven can complete a vivid vision in under six weeks; targeting under two weeks for decisive CEOs
• The main delay is the CEO sitting in indecision, not Vision Driven's throughput
• Packages start at $6,500 — includes facilitated interviews, multiple writing iterations, custom design, and rollout best practices
• Higher-tier packages include a full facilitated day for CEOs in major transitions

How to lock in and use the vivid vision

• Write it for a 3-year window; lock it in and don't revise it mid-cycle
• Resist the urge to keep changing it — the team needs to feel the arc toward completion
• Draft the next vivid vision in October, finalise in December, roll out in January
• At the end of the three years, highlight every sentence that came true in green; the white text shows what to carry forward or cut

Rollout sequence

1. Share with the leadership team first — get buy-in
2. Share with all employees
3. Share with stakeholders: suppliers, partners, accountants, lawyers, marketing vendors
4. Share with current customers
5. Share with potential employees and potential customers

Keeping it alive

• Reread the vivid vision every quarter — send it out to all employees and shareholders
• Use it at quarterly leadership retreats to anchor planning for the next 90 days
• Send it to job applicants before they apply; state clearly: if this doesn't excite you, don't apply
• Send it to prospective customers before signing them