Flow Engineering Triggers: Alignment

Proper alignment across an organization can be both critical to success and very difficult to attain. We like the combination of the North Star method along with Flow Engineering to set the direction and pave a more ideal path forward. Here we want to explore poor alignment as a trigger suggesting that these powerful methods combined are the answer to many common situations.

While your North Star provides the high-level guidance toward a unified direction it is Flow Engineering that paves the optimal way forward. A North Star sets the all-important target destination, but Flow Engineering enables at all levels to actually arrive at that destination. It is essential that individual teams understand how their work contributes to your North Star. Your North Star serves as the filter to ensure misaligned effort is filtered out in favor of effort that is aligned with achieving your most important goal.

This is where Flow Engineering really shines by improving collaboration, establishing a common understanding and delivering small focused incremental improvements. All of this combines to reduce or even eliminate any friction or resistance that might otherwise impede progress. Without it you might have a North Star but may wander the desert or get undermined by the resistance. Sure, you will probably get there eventually, but Flow Engineering helps blaze the trail and eliminates many of the obstacles that could impede progress and ultimate success.  

Some high level alignment factors to consider:

• Organizational restructuring such as re-orgs, mergers, acquisitions, and lay-offs
• Lack of clarity or poor communication of leadership vision
• Limited buy-in or commitment
• Resistance to change
• Lack of accountability for outcomes
• Insufficient connection to how team effort relates
• Conflicting priority, biases, interests or capabilities
• Inefficient tooling or processes, outdated skills or methods …

This is part 2 of our series focused on Flow Engineering triggers. By now it should be clear that lack of alignment represents a significant business risk. No, alignment is not in the same class as typical risks, but when allowed to fester can devastate the ability to compete effectively. As such it represents a form of risk that many overlook. Let us explore how Flow Engineering influences these obstacles to alignment in more detail in the table below.

Stats involving alignment issues

• 74% of employees retained after a lay-off report declined productivity. – Forbes
• 86% believe that ineffective communication is a major factor in alignment resulting in business failures – McGheePro
• 47% of projects fail to meet objectives due to alignment issues. – Lucid.co
• Highly aligned companies increase revenue 58% faster and are 72% more profitable than those that are not – Forbes

Flow Engineering triggers affecting alignment

Situations/Observations	How Flow Engineering applies
We just acquired another company and need to get everyone on the same page.	High Level: This is always a nervous time for those involved. At the same time events such as this are infrequent and tend to not get the optimized attention they deserve.   Flow Engineering can be applied to any process. Doing so here can be inspirational and even reduce both anxiety and friction contributing to engagement, stability, morale, and retention. Whether acquiring or being acquired – onboarding with an introduction to Flow Engineering can form an exciting bridge to join forces. Chances are good that the various processes involved (acquiring, onboard, re-orging, …) could be optimized with Flow Engineering.   In the trenches: Most may prefer the stability to carry on as they were. Generating some excitement and enthusiasm around changes can help a great deal. Being empowered to own how you work will likely be invigorating to those stuck in the status quo.
We have well defined company goals, but different parts of the company struggle to contribute to those goals.	High Level: It is not all that unusual for company goals to get lost in translation. It may not be clear how daily work is relevant or connects with those goals. Many layers of leaders add their spin & bias which could even create confusion and even conflict between orgs regarding priority and execution.   In the trenches: This is likely a side effect of translation involving middle leadership. People want to do the right thing, but some part of the mission gets mangled along the way. Pairing Flow Engineering with a clear North Star can help a great deal. Doing so ensures clarity and alignment regarding the work being done maps directly to goals.
We have great people who are very capable and eager to improve. Unfortunately, there is resistance to nearly every improvement suggested.	High Level: Often there is resistance to change and in some cases the benefits are not obvious or understood. In some cases, this is brought on by fear of the unknown. In many cases a common understanding of the situation as well as collaborative inclusion can diffuse both of these leading to the opposite extreme – acceptance and even enthusiasm. In the trenches: Friction tends to surface when something is being forced on us. We don’t understand the ‘why’ and ‘what’ so resist doing the ‘how’ part of it. This can manifest as extremes like actual sabotage but more often just frictional resistance and dragging of feet.
Our skills, tools and processes are out of date. While they get the job done, they seem to impede the ability to align with organizational goals.	High Level: When you are aware of it plowing forward with obsolete tools, techniques or skills can be painful and frustrating. You believe that you can do better but are unwilling or unable to explore alternatives. In the trenches: Most will do the best they can with what they have to work with. Some are inspired to seek out better ways and, in many cases, success is rewarded. In many cases though there are restraints or even pressure to continue as we have been. After all it got is where we are right – true but don’t expect it will keep you there. Retooling, upskilling and other forms of Technical Debt can impede alignment from top to bottom. Steady consideration of the incremental changes needed are not only less invasive but have immediate benefits that continually ease the path forward.
We have access to plenty of great resources. Unfortunately, they are all over the place with various efforts with some duplication of effort. It all seems important, but many are not linked to organizational goals.	High Level: People for the most part want to do their best work and make impactful contributions. Sadly, though there are often differing individual opinions, biases, abilities, and interests. Despite the best intentions these efforts may not actually translate to progress toward higher level goals. Proper alignment serves as a filter to help sharpen the focus and ensure that effort directly impacts the right progress. In the trenches: Insist on a North Star to serve as high level guidance toward an impactful goal. Take the time to understand how your work applies to achieving that goal. At the same time consider how the skills, tools, and techniques available to you help or hinder achieving that goal.   Take these ideas and apply Flow Engineering to establish a roadmap on how to improve then work through it to make it so. Then rinse and repeat because continuous improvement is a journey.

There are dozens more related triggers no doubt that we can add over time. Please add your situations below and we can either respond to them or add them to the list above.