#2 Team Vision & Motivation

Last week I released the Digital Leader Canvas — a free self-assessment framework with 11 dimensions of leadership. If you missed it, you can download it here: https://www.digital-leader-program.de/en/digital-leader-program-digital-leader-canvas

This week, we're diving into the first quadrant: Team Vision & Motivation.

But first - let me give you some tips on how to work with the canvas.

You can print it and fill it out or use post-its, you can use the online whiteboard and fill it out digitally. You can work on it by yourself or with a colleague, friend or together with your team. OR you use some LLM to be your counterpart:

Happy to hear your thoughts and feedback on that!

Ok, let's get to work now: Team Vision & Motivation

The three questions

This field asks you to reflect on three things:

What motivates me? Not the polished answer you'd give in a job interview. The real one.

What motivates my teammates? Not what you assume. What actually drives them.

What is our team vision? And this is where it gets interesting — because most people think "team vision" means a target number or an OKR. It can be that. But it can also be much more.

Your team vision is bigger than your KPIs

When I say "team vision," people usually think about goals. Revenue targets, product launches, quarterly objectives.

But your team vision can also describe the way you want to work together. The atmosphere you want to create. The processes you want to have in place. How automated and efficient your workflows should be. Even the level of sustainability consciousness you want your team to operate with.

A team vision isn't just about what you want to achieve. It's about who you want to be while achieving it. 

You can do this on a high level for your whole organization but also for each of your departments or project teams.

A real example: how I filled in this field

Let me walk you through how I filled in this quadrant for my own team — an education company focused on leadership development.

What motivates me:

I want to have a lasting impact on companies and people. I want to help change cultures for the better. And I want to do it with companies that produce smart, innovative products — products that are actually helping, not just adding noise.

My team vision:

I want to work with a small team — maximum seven people. Five seniors, two juniors that we constantly train and develop. That's a deliberate choice. It's not about headcount. It's about the kind of collaboration I want.

The vibe I'm going for:

This is where it gets personal. I want our team to be sustainability-conscious — not as a slogan, but as a real awareness in how we work, how we travel, how we treat our surroundings.

I want the mood and energy to be kind. Fun. The kind of environment where you walk into a meeting (or join a call — we don't really have an office) and you immediately feel: something successful is happening here. I want to be part of this.

I want us to be effective. If there are tools — including AI — that can take the tedious work off our plates, why wouldn't we use them? I'm not an AI evangelist, but if it helps us spend our time on what actually matters, let's go.

I want a culture of feedback. People looking over each other's shoulders — not to control, but to learn and to optimize. (Feedback has its own quadrant on the canvas, but it starts here, in the vibe you set.)

And I want us to be conflict-friendly. Not constant conflict. But an environment where you can disagree, challenge each other, and deal with it respectfully. No tiptoeing. No avoiding the hard conversations.

Your turn

That's what popped into my mind when I sat down with this field — spontaneously, honestly, in about five minutes. I'm sure more things will surface over time. That's the point. The canvas isn't meant to be filled in perfectly on the first pass. It's meant to get you started.

So here's what I'd suggest:

Grab the canvas (PDF or MURAL — both free), set a timer for 10 minutes, and fill in the Team Vision & Motivation field. Don't overthink it. Write down what comes to mind. You can always refine later.

And if you want to go deeper: try filling it in on your own first, then ask your teammates to do the same. Compare notes. The gaps between your answers are where the most valuable conversations happen.

👉 Download the canvas: https://www.digital-leader-program.de/en/digital-leader-program-digital-leader-canvas

Next week: Quadrant ② — Leadership Style. What are your values, and when should you tell vs. coach?

See you then.