Visioning


 * "A shared vision is not an idea. It is not even an important idea such as freedom. It is, rather, a force in people's hearts, a force of impressive power. It may be inspired by an idea, but once it goes further -- if it is compelling enough to acquire the support of more than one person -- then it is no longer an abstraction. It is palpable. People begin to see it as if it exists. Few, if any, forces in human affairs are as powerful as shared vision." Peter Senge Inspiring Quotes 2


 * "Vision without action is a daydream, action without vision is a nightmare." Japanese proverb Inspiring Quotes 21

Local Agenda 21 and similar sustainability programmes have often included a visioning stage. In simple terms it seeks to answer the question "Where do you want to be?" (applied to a network or community, typically in a few years time). Arguably one of the successes of programmes such as Local Agenda 21 (following on from the Rio Earth Summit) was in introducing more widely the idea that all stakeholders need to be involved in a visioning process for citizens and communities so that they get to feel some sense of ownership of the resultant vision statement.

Criticism of visioning
Visioning can sometimes feel like just a paper exercise that may not actually move things forward. Typically, within a broader strategic planning process, it is followed by an action planning and then an evaluation ("how did we do?") phase. If citizens and communities are not involved in all stages of the full process it is not surprising if there are various forms of disconnect.

Related Wikipedia content
Wikipedia does not appear to have an article about visioning in the sense it is used here. The closest appears to be Mission statements and vision statements though this is written very much from an organisational and business angle, rather than a network or civic society angle (summary intro like this needed here).