
The Power of Company Mottoes - jcurbo
https://mondaynote.com/the-power-of-company-mottoes-d57754146554
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Animats
Some good ones:

Newport News Shipbuilding and Dry Dock Company, which builds most large US
warships: ""We shall build good ships here, at a profit if we can, at a loss
if we must, but always good ships."

Microsoft mission statement through the 1990s: "A computer on every desk,
running Microsoft software". (Slogan retired because mission accomplished.)

National Security Agency: "Anything is possible, the impossible just takes
longer".

US Coast Guard: "You have to go out, but you don't have to come back."

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perseusprime11
They all sound good except for the last one. What do they mean by you dont
have to come back...

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jabbernotty
[https://www.uscg.mil/history/faqs/LSSmotto.asp](https://www.uscg.mil/history/faqs/LSSmotto.asp)

Basically, you can't know for sure that the sea is too rough to do the rescue
until you are already out at sea.

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jcbeard
So there I was. In the Army now. As a young adult I loved watching
Stripes...the real US Army is nothing like that. In Stripes Bill Murray just
got orders. In real life, you get orders and a commander's intent. When it
came my turn to give orders, I learned that intent and vision were what people
followed (assuming your troops have reason at all to follow the leader).
Orders/plans are great, but people do best when they have something to rally
around and fall back to for direction when everything else goes belly up (was
going to use Aussie version, but not appropriate). Mottoes from a company mean
almost nothing if they're not backed up by people who can grasp and believe in
them. It's all about the leadership and the people who follow the leader, not
the motto. Note: there are all kinds of leaders...don't always picture General
Patton or Steve Jobs.

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anexprogrammer
I think most mottoes and mission statements are there because someone thinks,
or was told, they _need_ one rather than because they actually have a mission.

So "Who Dares Wins", "Per ardua ad astra" and "Think Different" work because
you can easily believe the group actually believes in it. It matters not
whether you share the vision.

Things rapidly degenerate to sounding like they came from the Dilbert Mission
Statement generator for most companies.

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jmus
I like the motto for a US waste collection company that operates in the Vail,
CO area: "Satisfaction guaranteed or your trash back".

~~~
ISL
Works well until someone accidentally throws out a wedding ring and
subsequently wants _their_ trash back....

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ErrantX
At work we have a fairly long imperative, which is very nice but difficult to
keep in mind at all times.

We also have a four-word internal "motto" of sorts which entirely encapsulates
what we're aiming to do and is easily remembered at 3am when you need to make
a critical choice. It's honest, and I think that's why it gets quoted so much.

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cheriot
On the other hand, after the expensive consultants and off sites result in a
motto, what happens next? It's told each new employee during
indoctrination/onboarding and then forgotten. Quick, what's your employer's
motto? How about your last employer?

Effective mottoes and vision statements may be the result superior management,
but they don't make management superior.

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douche
Is This Good for the _COMPANY_?

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jkaptur
Linking to a subpage of Google's "about" site enabled the jab about the "real
mission" being advertising, but the true mission statement is clearly laid out
at [1], and certainly passes the 3AM-in-the-rain test: Google’s mission is to
organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and
useful.

[1]
[https://www.google.com/intl/en_us/about/company/](https://www.google.com/intl/en_us/about/company/)

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Fuxy
Speaking of company mottoes this reminds me on this[1] talk I was at.

It was quit a interesting insight into a small open source company.

[1]([https://media.ccc.de/v/emf2016-198-my-ubertooth-
year#video&t...](https://media.ccc.de/v/emf2016-198-my-ubertooth-
year#video&t=375)) at minute 36 ish.

