How To Build a Strong Team Vision

From Team Vision to Velocity
Activities and Habits That Bring Your Team’s Future to Life

You’ve asked your team to think about a vision. You’ve received a few blank stares, a reference to the company’s mission statement, and someone sharing a team vision they crafted on ChatGPT. Classic.

Most teams want to feel clear, connected, and inspired. But alignment doesn’t happen by accident. To build and implement a strong team vision, you need two things:

1. Activities to get people dreaming together
2. Habits to make that dream durable

This article gives you both. It’s a blend of our favorite team visioning experience plus a habit-building twist—so you can shape not just the what and why, but the how you’ll get there.

Step 1: Start With One-on-One Conversations

Begin exploring your team vision in one-on-ones. Ask:

• “What would amazing look like for our team?”

• “What would we be proud to be known for?”

• “How would we be working together?”

• “What would we need to do differently to get there?”

You’re not just collecting data. You’re planting vision seeds—and gathering language your team will recognize later.

Step 2: Get Visual—Metaphors Welcome

Now bring everyone together.

Ask each person to draw two pictures:

1. Where we are now
2. Where we want to be

Encourage metaphor. Sailboats, tangled cords, rocket ships, whitewater rafts—whatever helps them express how it feels to work here now, and how it could feel in the future. These drawings spark insight and often a little laughter (shoutout to the scientist who once drew a slime mold).

As the team shares, capture themes. These are your raw materials.

Step 3: Distill a Bold Vision

Use the themes to co-create a bold, clear team vision statement. Not something that sounds like it was run through a corporate jargon generator—something real, energizing, and yours.

Examples:

• “We’re the team that transforms confusion into clarity—for each other and our clients.”

• “We turn obstacles into energy—together.”

Say it out loud. Put it in writing. Use it until people start quoting it before you do.

Step 4: Build Habits to Live That Team Vision

A shared vision without shared habits is a motivational poster. Time to focus on habits.

ACTIVITY: Build Your Team Habits Charter

1. If you have a SynergyStack® habit deck, spread them out habit side up—or use index cards and have team members identify habits.
2. Ask:
   “Which of these habits—if we consistently practiced them—would help us live our vision?”
3. Let everyone choose 2–3 habits that feel most vital.
4. As a group, narrow it down to 4–6 habits to commit to as a team.

You might land on things like:

• “I clarify what success looks like.”

• “I follow through and keep my word.”

• “I ask for your perspective and consider what you say.”

• “I lighten the load by finding the fun.”

Then turn that momentum into something even more powerful.

Step 5: Turn Habits Into a Practical Team Agreement

Nice-sounding habits are a start. A shared commitment to how you’ll live them makes it stick.

ACTIVITY: Create Your Team Habits Agreement

For each habit:

• Define what it looks like in action
  (e.g., “In project kickoffs, we define what success looks like before diving in.”)

• Agree on how you’ll hold each other accountable

• Write it down in simple, clear language

• Name it—your “Team Code,” “Habits Pact,” “How We Roll”—whatever fits your style

Then post it where you can all see it and refer to it often.

See Also: How to Build a Team Agreement and Get Your Team On Track 

Step 6: Keep It Alive

Don’t let your team agreement become a laminated ghost of good intentions.

Build simple rhythms:

• Start team meetings with a “habit spotlight”

• Recognize when someone models a habit well

• Use it as a feedback framework in 1:1s

• Revisit quarterly: What’s working? What needs refreshing?

This creates shared ownership—and makes your habits part of the culture, not just a list.

Vision + Habits + Agreement = Team Momentum

You don’t need a perfect plan. You need a clear direction, the right habits and a team that says, “Yes—we’re in.”

This is how you build a team that doesn’t just work together, but thrives together.
Start with a picture. Choose a habit. Craft the agreement. Then build the future—one powerful, practiced habit at a time.

NOTE: This post was originally written in 2012 as one of my earliest articles on Let’s Grow Leaders (read here to learn about how LGL got started). It’s been significantly updated after working with teams all over the world to build and implement their strong team visions.