The Power of a Vision in a Complex World

First published on March 28, 2019

People tell the story of John F Kennedy and the race to put a man on the moon something like this: he put his vision out into the world. We are going to put a man on the moon. He didn't know what was going to happen, he didn't know how they were going to do it, but he put the vision out there, and so it happened.

But there's another space race story that I like better. It stars Kennedy again. This time he went to visit NASA headquarters. He met a janitor there, and asked, 'What do you do here?' 

The janitor said, 'I'm helping put a man on the moon.'

That's the power of a vision: it invites them to be part of it. 

I was talking to a client today about the difference between this - stating a vision at the visionary level, which invites people to see themselves as a part of that vision, a contributor to something important - and giving a vision with all the details already filled in. In the latter case you might say, this is what we're working towards, this is what we are going to do, this is what we need to do it. 

It might seem like the latter is a better vision, or a better business plan, but I don't think so, and especially not in the complex world we live in. 

In a world which gives leaders problems as wicked and complex as the race to put a man on the moon on a regular basis - maybe even more complex - it is tempting to think that a more detailed plan of action will help us get there. But, as Jennifer Garvey Berger says in her latest book - Unlocking Leadership Mindtraps - in a complex world, much as we hope for control, most of the time the control we think we create is a myth anyway. Or it traps us into controlling pointless things just because they are measurable, not because they help us achieve what we want to achieve. Instead of trying to control things, better by far to create conditions for things to thrive.

That's what Kennedy was doing he was offering that vision. He was saying: here is a vision, a vision to capture the human soul. How are we going to get there? I don't know. That's why I have all you scientists - and janitors - who can make it happen. 

Kennedy's job was to create the conditions for magic to happen. That's what I aim to do with my clients, and it's what you could aim to do, too, in whatever way you lead in the world. Don't try to control things, that's only a mirage anyway, and mostly it gets in the way of what you want to achieve. Instead, create conditions for magic to happen - inducing a vision that captures the human soul - and even you may be surprised by what you can achieve.