The MVP Effect
How Deep Saturation of Mission, Vision, and Purpose Separates Enduring Institutions from Everyone Else
Today we’re tackling one of the greatest misconceptions about mission, vision, and purpose.
If you understand this one shift, you’ll know why some teams run on fumes while others feel like they’re plugged into a power plant.
This is going to be a long one, but a good one. Grab your coffee (or tea, if you insist on being wrong).
Clarity
What’s the point of mission, vision, and purpose? (From here on, we’re calling it MVP…because typing all three words 27 times is a punishment no one deserves.)
If Simon Sinek’s “Start with Why” was enough, leaders wouldn’t keep saying: “I’m clear about our why; but my people still aren’t excited about it.”
That’s the trap. Leaders think their clarity automatically translates into collective commitment. Spoiler: it doesn’t.
Here’s the real difference between good organizations and excellent ones:
It’s not just that they have an MVP. It’s that the MVP saturates every level of the system.
At average orgs, the CEO can recite the MVP like a TED Talk.
Mid-level managers? They mumble through a watered-down version.
Entry-level staff? “Look, I’ve got a mortgage. Just tell me what to memorize so I can keep this job.”
At excellent orgs, something else happens. Everyone (from the corner office to the front desk) can articulate the MVP, but in their own words. The CEO’s version sounds polished. The cashier’s version sounds grounded. The through-line? They all carry the same energy, the same passion.
That is deep saturation. That is gold.
Trader Joe’s vs. Aldi’s
Let’s make it concrete. Trader Joe’s and Aldi’s. Two grocery chains. Opposite business models. Both thriving when competitors closed stores. Why? Same secret: MVP saturation.
At Trader Joe’s, ask where the cheese is. In most grocery stores, you’ll get “Aisle 17” and a polite smile. At TJ’s? The employee will physically walk you there (no matter how many boxes they were just stocking) and then start interrogating your dinner plans: “Pasta night? Then you need this pecorino, trust me.”
Why? Because TJ’s MVP is about warmth and experience. A grocery store that feels like your quirky best friend opened it just for you. They are so committed to this that they deliberately forfeit the millions they’d earn in curbside pickup: because forcing you into the store is the point. The vibe is the strategy.
Now Aldi: the mirror opposite. Efficiency, thrift, minimalism. You put in a quarter for the cart. You bag your own groceries. You don’t get 19 olive oils—you get one, and it’s dirt-cheap.
And yet, Aldi’s MVP is just as deeply saturated. The CEO articulates it in terms of ruthless focus and stripped-down cost savings. The cashier embodies it by scanning your cart at warp speed and never apologizing that you’re bagging your own bread. Different MVP, same depth.
That’s the lesson: it’s not what the MVP is. It’s how deeply it permeates. One org radiates friendliness. The other radiates efficiency. Both are saturated to the bone.
Coherence
Clarity gives you the “what matters.”
Coherence asks: does it all line up?
Most leaders stop at clarity. They craft beautiful words. They put them on posters, coffee mugs, onboarding packets. And then they wonder why nothing changes.
Case in point: the famous Got Milk? campaign. $100 million. Celebrity endorsements. Ubiquity. You couldn’t open a magazine in the 90s without seeing a milk mustache. Result? A 2% bump in milk sales.
Dr. Marcus Collins nails the diagnosis: awareness isn’t enough. Recognition doesn’t equal relevance. People knew the slogan…but it didn’t shift the meaning of milk in their lives. It never crossed from awareness to identification.
That’s the same trap with MVP. You can wallpaper your office with it. Doesn’t mean people internalize it.
Here’s the difference:
Awareness = I’ve seen it.
Identification = I see myself in it.
Internalization = it changes how I act.
That’s why a Trader Joe’s cashier once stopped scanning my groceries, disappeared for five minutes, and came back with flowers because I’d casually mentioned my anniversary. That moment wasn’t in the handbook. It was MVP, internalized. Awareness becomes identity, identity becomes action.
Without coherence, your MVP is decoration. With it, your MVP becomes lived meaning.
Action
Most leaders imagine the cycle goes like this:
I have an MVP that inspires me.
I share it.
People catch the spark.
We all march forward together.
That’s tidy. But it’s not how humans actually work.
Here’s the better way: yes, share your MVP. But also ask your people: “In this season of your life, where are you trying to go?”
Now…whatever they say? Treat it like gold. Don’t correct it. Don’t squeeze it into your framework. Honor it. Keep it in mind. And where you can, help them move toward it.
Because when you show up for their MVP, you earn the right to connect it back to yours. That’s how meaning flows both ways. When someone sees even a fragment of their own values reflected inside the organization’s MVP, the shift happens: it stops being abstract awareness and starts becoming personal meaning.
That meaning is what drives saturation.
One practical step: get better at storytelling. Facts slip away. Stories stick, even half-true ones. Think about the last conference you went to. Do you remember the official title of your favorite session? Probably not. Do you remember who you sat next to? Almost certainly. The story of the moment clung to you, the fact evaporated.
The same principle applies to MVP. The more you can weave it into stories that connect to people’s lived ambitions, the higher the chance it internalizes. That’s when you stop leading with posters and start leading with meaning.
Signal Boost
“If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.” -African proverb
Why this matters: speed is clarity in one person’s head. Distance is clarity shared by everyone else. One leader with vision is a sprinter. A whole organization with saturation? That’s endurance. That’s the marathon.
Final Thought:
Clarity on its own is fragile. Leaders can be perfectly clear, yet their organizations stumble in fog because clarity never saturated. The MVP Effect is what separates the sprinters from the institutions: when mission, vision, and purpose sink so deep they become muscle memory at every level.
Vision builds momentum. Saturation builds institutions.