V2MOM is a method invented by Marc Benioff, founder of Salesforce, to achieve a «high level of organizational alignment and communication while growing at breakneck speed». The acronym stands for vision, values, methods, obstacles and measures. The method is described in Salesforce story, Behind the Cloud.
The vision helped us define what we wanted to do. The values established what was more important about the vision; it sets the principles and beliefs that guided it (in priority). The methods illustrated how we would get the job done by outlining the actions and the steps that everyone needed to take. The obstacles identified the challenges, problems, and issues we would have to overcome to achieve our vision. Finally, the measures specified the actual result we aimed to achieve; often this was defined as a numerical outcome. Combined, V2MOM gave us a detailed map of where we were going as well as a complete compass to direct us there.
Essentially, V2MOM is an exercise in awareness in which the results is total alignment. In addition, having a clarified direction and focusing collective energy on the desired outcome eliminate the anxiety that is often present in times of change.Salesforce.com First V2MOM, 4/12/1999
Vision
Rapidly create a world-class Internet company/site for Sales Force Automation.Values
1. World-class organization
2. Time to market
3. Functional
4. Usability (Amazon quality)
5. Value-added partnershipMethods
1. Hire the team
2. Finalize product specification and technical architecture
3. Rapidly develop the product specification to beta and production stages
4. Build partnerships with big e-commerce, content, and hosting companies
5. Build launch plan
6. Develop exit strategy: IPO/acquisitionObstacles
1. Developers
2. Product managers/business development personMeasure
1. Prototype in state-of-the-art
2. High-quality functional system
3. Partnership are online and integrated
4. Salesforce.com is regarded as leader and visionary
5. We are all richFrom the very beginning, we’ve had a V2MOM as Salesforce.com, and we’ve always kept it updated… I rewrite the V2MOM every six months, which helps me gain personal clarity as well as communicate with the company.
Immediately after I write the V2MOM, I share it with our top offices at our weekly meetings and ask for their feedback. Sometimes they love it and sometimes they hate it, but the exercise always ensures a worthy debate. Once everyone comes to an agreement, we bring the V2MOM to ore “Core”, which is how we refer to our top thirty officers, and we then incorporate their insights.
This process of constant iteration is critical to making the V2MOM accurate as well as to integrate there ideas into our corporate consciousness…
We now collaborate on the corporate V2MOM with all Salesforce.com employees through IdeaExchange, a social networking tool that employees use to contribute their ideas as well as promote and comment others’ ideas…
Although we use one corporate V2MOM to direct Salesforce.com, V2MOMs cascade throughout the entire organization. We’ve created a system whereby each executive builds his or her own V2MOM from the corporate V2MOM, and then his or her direct reports create their own V2MOM to guide him or her for the coming year. This is how we align individual and corporate goals and demonstrate how everyone fits into the organization.Vision statements
1999. Rapidly create a world-class Internet company/site for Sales Force Automation.
2002. Global leadership in proving the software as a service model driven by an enthusiastic and wildly successful customer community, and energized by world-class employees.
2004. Dominate the software as a service market by doubling our enthusiastic and wildly successful global customer community through flawless execution of our proven model.
2006. Deliver trusted customer and partner success globally, and accelerate our growth as the unrivaled on-demand standard for The Business Web through efficient execution.
2009. Create wildly successful customers, secure every renewal, and grow our customer relationships through Service Cloud and Force.com. Increase the productivity of every employee and every department, to gain market share and dominate enterprise cloud computing.