Where To? Vision Is The Compass That Sets and Sustains a Course for Success

This article is part of the Unleash the Leader Within series and focuses on L - Looking Towards the Future, the first pillar of the L.E.A.D. framework. We’ll explore how crafting a compelling “Where To” vision aligns your team and keeps their focus and energy through challenges, setting the foundation for impactful leadership.

As leaders, we all want success - for ourselves, our teams, and the organizations we serve.

But success requires direction, focus, and persistence, especially when challenges emerge. How can you achieve this? By defining your “Where To?”... where you WANT to go.

If you’ve been following me for a while, you have come across this idea. Last year alone, I’ve given 75 talks on the topic. Like any product-minded leader, I’ve iterated on my talk to go from “Where To? / Where From? / Where Next?” to a stronger focus on the importance of defining “Where To?”. That’s because “Where To?” is about defining a clear vision, a picture of the future that inspires, aligns, and guides everyone on the team.

This very idea sits at the core of my L.E.A.D. framework and is what L- Look towards the future is all about.

Today, we’ll dive into the power of "Where To? within L.E.A.D., explore why it matters, and discuss how leaders can create their own compass to set and sustain the course for success.

Why "Where To" Matters

Having a "Where To?" vision is a NECESSITY for every team, and thus to every leader.

A clear vision provides three critical benefits to you and your team:

1. Direction: Vision sets a course, ensuring that every decision and action aligns with a shared destination. Without it, you risk your team wandering aimlessly, like hikers without a map. They might go from one place to another, only to return to the starting point with their next move. Movement without direction does not equal progress.

2. Focus: We live in a world full of opportunities. While options might be positive, it can also overwhelm you and your team, creating distractions that steer you away from where you want to go. Having a vision narrows the choices, ensuring your resources are allocated to what truly matters.

3. Resilience: Challenges are inevitable. But when roadblocks appear, having a vision provides a steadying force which recalibrates teams to not lose sight of the ultimate goal. Additionally, because a vision is an emotional driver, it sparks enthusiasm, fuels purpose, and inspires commitment all of which help with resilience.

On the flip side, lacking a vision results in stagnation, misalignment, and scattered decision-making. Before you notice it, you find your team falling into the trap of reactive thinking, constantly asking “What should we do next?” instead of moving intentionally and autonomously toward a long-term goal.

People don’t get emotionally connected to plans, but they get inspired to walk the extra mile if they’re chasing a DREAM. The magical thing I learned from Pastor Arthur Jackson III that “dreamers may die, but dreams live on.” (This also seems to be an Iron Maiden quote, but I heard it at a place of worship).

If as a leader, you primary role is to create a “Where To?” for your team, how can you do that?

How Leaders Create a "Where To"

Building vision, a compass for success, starts with storytelling.

A vision is a narrative, a story of a better future that shows how we can create it together. It’s not a bullet point list or a set of OKRs. Let’s break it down:

• Paint the Picture: A vision should describe what success looks like in a way that’s vivid and memorable. For example, I was a Product Lead at JustWorks, a payroll software company. What seems like a “boring” product at first sight, turned into a compelling one when leadership set the vision: “helping entrepreneurs grow with confidence”. Suddenly, it wasn’t about payroll anymore, but about empowering people to build their dreams.

• Inspire Emotion: Emotion drives action, so you need to spark that feeling in your team. Tinder is a great example of this. Their original vision, “making meeting singles easy and fun” fell short. While the product was seemingly fun, there was no real emotion attached to it. People were matching on the app, but not getting out to coffee shops or parks to meet in real life. A change in vision was a way to achieve the lack of emotion. The new vision: “powering real connections.” This shift completely transformed their business and the product’s impact.

• Make It Practical: Vision isn’t just about using lofty words, it’s also about measuring impact in practical ways. My favorite example of this is Tracy Britt Cool’s contribution to Pampered Chef. When she was brought into the company, she paired their vision for a meritocratic culture with actionable metrics, such as tracking "we" vs. "me" language in meetings. This was a practical way to measure success, allowing teams to bring vision to life.

If you’re a leader struggling to set your team’s “Where To?”, I recommend using one of my favorite techniques, the thank-you note exercise.

Imagine a future where your vision has been realized. What would a customer, team member, or partner write to thank you for the value you created? This reverse-engineering approach grounds vision in tangible outcomes while inspiring bold aspirations.

I also recently created a “Crafting a Compelling Vision” worksheet to guide everyone through the steps to generate a motivational Where To? for their teams.

Conclusion

"Where To" isn’t just another leadership tool; it’s the FOUNDATION for success.

It sets the stage for Empowering teams, Activating supporters, and Deciding Swiftly and Thoughtfully - the remaining pillars of the LEAD framework. Without a vision, the rest crumbles.

But here’s the truth: no framework, not even L.E.A.D, is one-size-fits-all. Your "Where To?" must reflect your unique team, challenges, and goals. Frameworks are vanilla. Your team is the mint chocolate chip. Customize it. Collaborate. Make it yours.

So, let’s end with this question: What’s YOUR "Where To"? If you haven’t defined it yet, now’s the time. Because once you do, you’ll be amazed at how far your compass can take you.