Vision & Mission
Gain alignment by making the work clear to everyone — from the vision all the way to the success measures.
Overview
This template is a little different from the others. Its purpose is the good practice of putting things in writing. That has a few huge benefits: it ensures the team has done the work, it keeps everyone focused on what matters most, and it ensures everyone is on the same page (literally).
Vision — a statement about the future you'd like to see; it reminds people of the strategic nature of the effort. Mission — how the team plans to make the vision a reality. Goals — the concrete things the team will do, and ideally when. Metrics — making the success measurement explicit.
The vision shouldn't change very often, but the others can evolve over time. The most important part is just getting something on paper to start, which aligns the team and stakeholders.
Driving Alignment
On a project we consulted on, there was a misunderstanding between the team and a stakeholder. The confusion came from something as simple as the word "Beta." The stakeholder said a Beta release by a certain date; the team started talking about a Pilot release; then people started saying MVP.
Finally we put a slide together listing all those different things, took it to the stakeholder, and said, "tell us what you expect." Sometimes the simple act of writing things down and driving that clarity is all that's needed — which is exactly what this template does.