Mission Impossible or Paradise Regained?

Gives a preliminary exploration into mission statements and their impact on nurses′ attitudes towards them. Mission statements are given much credence by top level management, as part of the thrust towards corporate identity. Only 15 per cent of nurses (from an opportunistic sample of 87) acknowledged that mission statements were directly resonant with their own practice; 75 per cent did not know the originators of their mission statements; others were vague about their organization possessing one. Mission statements are best considered here as an organization rhetoric, a facet of managerial ideology. More research is needed to evaluate critically, by case studies, the impact of mission statements, as an organizational variable on, for example,health treatment and budgeting. Semiotics and communication theories offer this opportunity.