Enhancing Your Company's Mission, by Corinne Maddox, CCM, CFM

As the owner's representative on a project team, one of your major roles is to assure that your project team identifies and supports your company's mission. First of all, do you know what its mission is? A good way to find out is to read your company website. Is it about customer service? Efficiency? Innovation? How does your company measure success? It may be industry ratings, product sales, new customers or market share. Build a project-specific mission based on your company's mission to energize and focus your team, and frequently ask how the project decisions support that mission. Get an executive to champion the cause. During the programming phase, find out the driver of the requirements. Why does the department need more space? Why is the department growing? Why is that industry sector growing? What is driving the market? Often, designers overlook these important questions during the programming and design phase. They are in a hurry to get started doing what they love to do: design! The results of ignoring the mission may be a great design but the wrong solution, similar to making a trip but arriving at the wrong destination. You can make a difference, and you will get executive level attention when you do!