The key ingredient in high-performing teams
How great leaders set a direction people actually believe in
Matt Hunter • June 23, 2026
The stories we tell are some of the most important elements of success in business. If you have a bold mission, you must be able to share it compellingly to scale your business. That’s where good storytelling comes in. As Don Valentine, venture capitalist and founder of Sequoia, explains, “The art of storytelling is incredibly important. And many—maybe even most of the entrepreneurs who come to talk to us can’t tell the story. Learning to tell a story is incredibly important because that’s how the money works. The money flows as a function of the stories.”
How does this work? In Sapiens, Yuval Noah Harari writes that humans coordinate at scale through shared stories. These stories become like codes that tell us who we are, what we do, and what we won’t do. Company culture is a shared story; it’s your manifesto expressed collectively. If you aren't familiar with what a manifesto is, check out my last post here. When enough people believe the same story, cooperation and speed toward a common goal compound. If the manifesto is weak, culture drifts and work ethic declines; if it’s strong, culture locks in around serious, important work. Management literature supports this: Visionary leadership correlates with greater cohesion, commitment, trust, motivation, and performance. So what exactly sits inside a manifesto? A company’s manifesto is the set of guiding principles and rules of engagement: the complete package of its vision (where we’re going), mission (what we’re doing, and why it matters), values (what we believe), and standards (clear expectations). Today, we'll dive into vision.
Don’t underestimate the power of a bold, believable, emotionally charged vision. Your vision is the horizon your company is moving toward. Great leaders declare a future whose importance is unmistakable and worth the sacrifice. It should be big enough to feel almost impossible, credible enough to be pursued, specific enough to have meaning, and unmistakably important for humanity. And it must come directly from the leader. Avoid visions that are so unbelievable they can’t inspire action, so timid they can’t inspire it, or so vague they don’t truly stand for anything.
Effective leaders pick one of two main storylines for their vision that reliably mobilize people at scale in the business world: Change the world, or be the best. SpaceX and Tesla embody the first: civilizational stakes expressed through tangible products. Viral YouTube creator MrBeast demonstrates the second: Make the best YouTube videos, period. To be clear, there are countless other storylines you can use to great effect (restoring what’s been lost, liberating the oppressed, achieving a new level of excellence in a narrow domain, uniting what’s divided, or awakening the spirit). When the vision is merely a quick exit or a cash grab, people sense it, and performance suffers. If you want to reliably inspire strong followership in business, stick to changing the world or being the best.
If you’re not trying to change the world, don’t purpose-wash your vision. The pressure to posture as a world-changing company is real, especially for large corporations trying to stay relevant or founders chasing status. So many legacy companies (such as soda brands) aim for the highest-level stories of global impact. They establish environmental, social, and governance departments, hire storytelling teams, and hope no one notices the gap. But it often backfires. When the vision doesn’t align with the work, people sense the disconnect. A toothpaste brand claiming to reverse climate change doesn’t inspire belief; it breeds cynicism. It would be pretty damn refreshing if companies without a clear social purpose simply admitted it and instead focused on being the best in their category. Rightsize your importance: What matters is that your vision is believable, motivating to some people, and grounded in what you actually do. Yeti doesn’t pretend its coolers will end poverty. Instead, they strive to improve outdoor experiences by building durable, exceptionally performing products. In short, they aim to be the best at what they do. You don’t have to save the world. You just have to pick a vision worth believing.
PS. I want to give a shout-out to Amy Morin's new book, The Mental Strength Playbook: 50 Tools to Cope with Stress, Thrive Under Pressure, and Gain a Competitive Edge in the Workplace. I have been enjoying the awesome tools she shares, and I think it's a wonderful companion to this journey of being a tougher leader. Definitely check it out.