Page 211 - Performance Leadership

200 • Part III Principles from the Values and Social Dimensions

come third. The mission statement follows a compelling order of
importance.
Lehman Brothers, a U.S.-based financial services firm founded in
1850, states: “Our mission is to build unrivaled partnerships with and
value for our clients, through the knowledge, creativity, and dedication
of our people, leading to superior results for our shareholders.” The
mission statement mentions again three stakeholders. First, the cus-
tomer is mentioned. Although the mission statement doesn’t really
directly focus on the needs of the employees, it describes their knowl-
edge, creativity, and dedication, which should be appealing to current
and future employees; therefore, staff is the second stakeholder to
be addressed. Shareholders are mentioned third, in a cause-and-effect
relationship.
The overall analysis revealed a total of seven stakeholders: customers,
the organization itself, staff, the community, shareholders, partners and
suppliers, and, lastly, some mission statements use the umbrella term
stakeholder.

Customers
It should not be a surprise that most mission statements, 76 percent to
be precise, mention the customer as a crucial stakeholder. In 42 percent
of all mission statements, the customer is even mentioned first. Further,
in more than half of the cases (55 percent) when only one stakeholder
is mentioned in the mission statement, it is the customer. In 24 percent
of cases, though, the customer is mentioned last. In the majority of cases
where this happens, only two stakeholders are mentioned. Typically, in
those mission statements the organization is mentioned first. For
instance, Avery Dennison’s mission statement reads, “To be the world
leader in products, services, and solutions that enable and transform the
way consumers and businesses gather, manage, distribute and commu-
nicate information.” In this case, the customer is considered the most
important external stakeholder.
This analysis shows clearly that the customer is considered the most
important stakeholder. Peter Drucker is widely quoted to have said that
“The purpose of a business is to create a customer, and the stakeholder
analysis shows that the mission statements at least acknowledge that.”
In complex value chains, the people or organizations a business sells