Maintaining a clear focus on the stated goals and vision of an organization can support internal cohesion and guide strategic decision-making toward achieving the organization’s goals. The scale and scope of injustices can be overwhelming, but getting drawn into issues that are not central to the organizations’’ main causes can bog them down and weaken activists’ energies. 

Robi Damelin notes that the Parent’s Circle/Family Forum focuses on reconciliation and ending Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territories. The group engages in many activities and in partnership with diverse organizations and movements, but all activities are directly linked to their short- and long-term goals. When specific incidents occur that demand attention, the group decides whether to respond as an organization based on whether it advances these goals. Robi notes, “There are certain things that are not our battle even though we as individuals fight, but not as an organization necessarily.”  This group’s example illustrates the importance of not engaging in issues that are not directly linked to organizational goals.

Black Lives Matter activists in the Southwestern United States also discuss the importance of making goals and vision apparent. In their case, public-facing platforms such as social media are an important tool for outward expression of the organization’s vision. They share, 

Yeah so for us, social media is a way to communicate our agenda, so you know, you definitely want to be able to use that for your own platform. You know, what’s your vision, what’s your agenda, so that people understand where you’re coming from, what it is that you’re seeking to do with that platform.

Another Black Lives Matter activist speaks about how, even when building a coalition, it is important to maintain a focus on the organization’s core purpose by identifying spaces and issues that are shared - and also those that should be addressed separately. 

The vision of Black Lives Matter [in this region] at least has always been from the beginning was to teach black people that black lives matter. [...] However, because we believe in Ally-ship, actually Accomplice-ship, we do have spaces and events that center black and brown people, and that’s including indigenous communities [...] So we have events together and we come to each other’s events but we also respect their needs and space as well. So we, because, remember that these movements are not all created equal even though they run, they are running parallel to each other…[A] LatinX person...does not necessarily have all the same issues that a black person does so there has to be a space for that.

In order to scale an organization, therefore, it is important to center decision-making around its vision and goals both when it comes to programming or next steps and when building partnerships or coalitions. 

Challenges you may encounter using this tool

• Organizations are made up of a diversity of individuals, and participants may not always see eye to eye or have different interests that are not fully aligned. It can be hard to turn away from individual interests when there is a desire by key leaders or actors to react to things on behalf of the organization or movement even when those things may be outside the core mission.

• Large and established organizations can be particularly challenging to keep on message because they require more extensive decision-making structures to bring in a multitude of voices and perspectives. It may be challenging to reach decisions internally if such organizations use poorly structured or consensus decision making models, which may have been appropriate for a smaller or community based organization, but are no longer viable as the organization grows.