4 Reasons Why Every Company Needs a North Star

Starting a business takes an incredible amount of grit and determination. Even when you’ve got it running, the challenges never end. You’re bound to encounter all sorts of obstacles, change your strategy several times, think on your feet–you’re forced to go through turbulent growth, in other words, to survive.

It’s easy to get swept up in the chaos, which is why you need one thing that’ll stay constant no matter what. That’s where your company’s mission statement comes in: what is the ultimate purpose of your company? More than a product description or number-based metrics, it should express the value that your service or product offers to your customers.

As ambitious as they are, mission statements are usually concise and easy to remember:

• Google: “To organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful.”
• Tech in Asia: “To serve and build Asia’s tech communities.”
• Eatigo: “To connect empty tables with empty stomachs.”
• Spud Buds: “To uplift the lives of our local potato growers in Benguet one spud at a time.”

What does your company stand for? 

Think of it as your company’s north star. Historically–back when we didn’t have GPS and navigating by compass could be unreliable–travellers and sailors made sure that they knew how to find the north star in the sky. Unlike a magnetic compass, the north star has a fixed location and always points to true north. As long as you can see it, you’ll never get lost.

The north star was so important for navigation that it was found in many cultures and traditions, carrying different names such as Polaris, Kynosoura, and even Pivot of the Planets. Although we don’t need it as much today, it’s taken on a new significance as a metaphor. We can have our personal north star–what we really want out of life–but it’s also helpful for companies.

It provides an unwavering sense of direction

As a business scales, tasks multiply exponentially. Changes happen at an alarming rate. No matter how hawk-eyed you fancy yourself to be, you can never keep track of everything, from major management decisions to the smallest details.

Having a north star helps keep the big picture in mind. When mapping out your strategy, your north star shows you the direction you need to keep going in, and this builds momentum over time.

It acts as a yardstick for progress

Metrics are a good way to objectively assess how well you’re doing. The tricky part is choosing which metrics to track: if you’re a social media manager, do you evaluate your number of posts, how many people reacted per post, or the clickthrough rate?

The higher-level you go, the more difficult it gets to handpick metrics. If it’s the entire company that you’re looking at, your north star hints at what your metrics should be; progress means moving closer to it.  

It keeps you going through hard times

There will be low periods when it seems like everything’s going wrong and you’re wondering why you even thought of doing this in the first place. Your north star can give you that extra burst of motivation when you need it the most.

This isn’t just a feel-good platitude. Major companies such as LEGO and Starbucks were on the brink of disaster, but they were saved when they pivoted back to their original mission and values.  

It builds a unified company culture

The north star gives a crucial context to what every single member of the company does.  Rather than viewing their responsibilities as isolated tasks, employees become aware of how their work contributes to the overall mission. Fixing a bug, say, might seem trivial compared to developing a major feature of an app, but it actually holds a lot of weight when you think about the end goal. Interviews and orientations are a good way to introduce employees to the mission statement–you can even ask them to know it by heart.

 

Businesses with clearly defined mission and vision statements informing their strategy do better than businesses without. Crafting your company’s north star may take a great deal of care, but it’s worth it.

Our mission at Sprout–as you can see at the bottom of our website–is to transform HR in emerging markets. If you’re looking to optimize your HR and payroll processes so you can focus better on your own mission, let’s talk at info@sprout.ph.  

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