{"id":4477,"date":"2024-04-18T16:17:26","date_gmt":"2024-04-18T20:17:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.mozilla.org\/ux\/?p=4477"},"modified":"2024-06-12T18:32:08","modified_gmt":"2024-06-12T22:32:08","slug":"on-purpose-collectively-defining-our-teams-mission-statement","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.mozilla.org\/ux\/2024\/04\/on-purpose-collectively-defining-our-teams-mission-statement\/","title":{"rendered":"On Purpose: Collectively Defining Our Team\u2019s Mission Statement"},"content":{"rendered":"

How the Firefox User Research team crafted our mission statement<\/em><\/p>\n

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Firefox illustration by UX designer Gabrielle Lussier<\/a><\/p><\/div>\n

Like many people who work at Mozilla, I\u2019m inspired by the organization\u2019s mission<\/a>: to ensure the Internet is a global public resource, open and accessible to all<\/em>. In thinking about the team I belong to, though, what\u2019s our piece of this bigger puzzle?<\/p>\n

The Firefox User Research team tackled this question early last year. We gathered in person for a week of team-focused activities; defining a team mission statement was on the agenda. As someone who enjoys workshop creation and strategic planning, I was on point to develop the workshop. The end goal? A team-backed statement that communicated our unique purpose and value.<\/p>\n

Mission statement development was new territory for me. I read up on approaches for creating them and landed on a workshop design (adapted from MITRE\u2019s Innovation Toolkit<\/a>) that would enable the team to participate in a process of collectively reflecting on our work and defining our shared purpose.<\/p>\n

To my delight, the workshop was fruitful and engaging. Not only did it lead us to a statement that resonates, it sparked meaningful discussion along the way.<\/p>\n

Here, I outline the five workshop activities <\/strong>that guided us there.<\/p>\n

1) Discuss the value of a good mission statement<\/strong><\/p>\n

We kicked off the workshop by discussing the value of a well-crafted statement. Why were we aiming to define one in the first place? Benefits include: fostering alignment between the team\u2019s activities and objectives, communicating the team\u2019s purpose, and helping the team to cohere around a shared direction. In contrast to a vision statement, which describes future conditions in aspirational language, a mission statement describes present conditions in concrete terms.<\/p>\n

In our case, the team had recently grown in size to thirteen people. We had a fairly new leadership team, along with a few new members of the team. With a mix of longer tenure and newer members, and quantitative and mixed methods researchers (which at one point in the past had been on separate teams), we wanted to inspire team alignment around our shared goals and build bridges between team members.<\/p>\n

2) Individually answer a set of questions about our team\u2019s work<\/strong><\/p>\n

Large sheets of paper were set up around the room with the following questions:<\/p>\n

A. What do we, as a user research team, do?<\/p>\n

B. How do we do what we do?<\/p>\n

C. What value do we bring?<\/p>\n

D. Who benefits from our work?<\/p>\n

E. Why does our team exist?<\/p>\n

Markers in hand, team members dispersed around the room, spending a few minutes writing answers to each question until we had cycled through them all.<\/p>\n

\"People

Team members during the workshop<\/p><\/div>\n

3) Highlight keywords and work in groups to create draft statements<\/strong><\/p>\n

Small groups were formed and were tasked with highlighting keywords from the answers provided in the previous step. These keywords served as the foundation for drafting statements, with the following format provided as a helpful guide:<\/p>\n

Our mission is to (A \u2014 what we do<\/em>) by (B \u2014 how we do it<\/em>).<\/p>\n

We (C \u2014 the value we bring<\/em>) so that (D \u2014 who benefits from our work<\/em> ) can (E \u2014 why we exist<\/em>).<\/p>\n

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One group\u2019s draft statement from Step 3<\/p><\/div>\n

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4) Review and discuss resulting statements<\/strong><\/p>\n

Draft statements emerged remarkably fluidly from the activities in Steps 2 and 3. Common elements were easy to identify (we develop insights and shape product decisions), while the differences sparked worthwhile discussions. For example: How well does the term \u2018human-centered\u2019 capture the work of our quantitative researchers? Is creating empathy for our users a core part of our purpose? How does our value extend beyond impacting product decisions?<\/p>\n

As a group, we reviewed and discussed the statements, crossing out any jargony terms and underlining favoured actions and words. After this step, we knew we were close to a final statement. We concluded the workshop, with a plan to revisit the statements when we were back to work the following week.<\/p>\n

5) Refine and share for feedback<\/strong><\/p>\n

The following week, we refined our work and shared the outcome with the lead of our Content Design practice for review. Her sharp feedback included encouraging us to change the phrase \u2018informing <\/em>strategic decisions\u2019 to \u2018influencing<\/em> strategic decisions\u2019 to articulate our role as less passive \u2014 a change we were glad to make. After another round of editing, we arrived at our final mission statement:<\/p>\n

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Our mission is to influence strategic decisions through systematic, qualitative, and quantitative research. We develop insights that uncover opportunities for Mozilla to build an open and healthy internet for all.<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Closing thoughts<\/strong><\/p>\n

If you\u2019re considering involving your team in defining a team mission statement, it makes for a rewarding workshop activity. The five steps presented in this article give team members the opportunity to reflect on important foundational questions (what value do we bring?), while deepening mutual understanding.<\/p>\n

Crafting a team mission statement was much less of an exercise in wordsmithing than I might have assumed. Instead, it was an exercise in aligning on the bigger questions of why we exist and who benefits from our work. I walked away with a better understanding of the value our team brings to Mozilla, a clearer way to articulate how our work ladders up to the organization\u2019s mission, and a deeper appreciation for the individual perspectives of our team members.<\/p>\n

Thank you for reviewing a draft of this post, Emily Wachowiak and Rosanne Scholl.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/section>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/article>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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