We built Alignd around how progress really happens - through shared clarity and focus on the things that matter most.
Implementing strategies is hard. As much as 90% of them fail. By blending timeless wisdom and emergent technologies, we created a platform and methodology that simplifies the process of staying on the same page and accelerates progress. We believe it will make your strategy among the 10% that succeed.
Here are the evolving set of principles that guide “the Alignd Method,” developed by our team of strategists, developers, organizational psychologists and…humans.
Clarity precedes success
Everything begins with shared clarity - what are we collectively working towards and why? What is the ever-evolving set of strategies that will get us there? What are the most important things right now? And are our people (our most valuable asset) focused on those things? The answers to these questions establish shared clarity.
It is that clarity that precedes success.
Strategy happens at the fork in the road
Executing a strategy requires a series of coordinated decisions - a fork in the road that leads one way or the other. If everything is the most important, nothing is.
Strategy is, in a real sense, about deciding what not to do. Say no to the good, so you can say yes to the great.
Where focus goes, energy flows.
The catalyzing mechanism of Alignd is based on the daily and weekly ritual of strategic intention setting. Strategies succeed or fail in the daily and weekly rhythm of your business - and on your team’s ability to focus on what matters most.
We think of strategy like a daily meal. You may have eaten yesterday, but - to be your best self - you’ll want to eat again today. That “daily meal” is a fresh opportunity to make a choice. However, being full doesn’t mean you’re nourished. In the same way, being busy at work is not the same as being productive. As Hemingway said, “never confuse movement with action.”
Time and energy are finite resources - they should flow with purpose. Intentions create reality.
No one can whistle a symphony.
Success hinges on your ability to coordinate your focus and energy to those around you. Put another way, in every great organization, the whole is always greater than the sum of the parts. Seeing what your inter-dependents are focused on will unblock you, accelerate your efforts and unleash your team’s potential. In the orchestra, if the cello ignores the oboe, and the timpani plays without regard for the clarinet, it’s not music…it’s just noise.
Knowing where you are is the only way to get where you’re going.
Frequency of reviews (who’s moving where, what’s our progress, where are there roadblocks, duplications…) increases your ability to predict success. Establishing transparency of focus and intention makes it possible to assess clarity and alignment in real-time. In other words, are we moving together in the direction of what matters? The answer to this question is the leading indicator of future success.
Alignd creates a single-source of truth of the strategic path forward — from the longer-term goals to short-term success criteria. This creates shared clarity around what matters most.
Alignd makes it easy to set and update strategic weekly intentions that ladder up to goals. This happens on the Team-level and by individuals setting the key priorities for the week.
With the “daily sticky,” individuals take a moment of strategic intention setting and share that strategic focus with team members.
Alignd creates asynchronous visibility to what teams are focused on, and who is on which team. The platform makes it easy to find and leverage the skills and proficiencies that exist with the organization.
The insights and reporting provide a real-time picture of where focus is flowing. This data represents leading indicators of future success or early warning signs of misalignment. The goals page also provides regular assessments of progress.
The murmuration of coordinated agility is like Starlings
The murmuration of starlings is a natural phenomenon that is not just mesmerizing in its beauty, it’s a useful metaphor for how a modern organization should aspire to move. These flock movements are characterized by the synchronized, swirling movements of thousands of starlings flying together in cohesive and fluid formations. They form ever-changing shapes, undulating waves, twisting vortexes and billowing clouds of starlings.
This remarkable coordination is rooted in awareness. Scientists have studied these flock movements and, through computer and mathematical modeling, have determined that each starling seems to have visibility to the outer edges of the flock but is, in particular, aware of the refined movements of about seven other starlings around it. It is through this combined “vision of the whole” and an awareness of the specific movements of a small cohort that enable the entire flock to move with remarkable fluidity. We call this “coordinated agility,” and our platform and our methodology aspires to enable this type of beautiful synchronization.
Another way to consider the concept of murmuration is in the framework of “Team of Teams.” “Team of Teams” is an organizational mindset that combines the agility, adaptability and cohesion of a small team with the power and resources of a larger organization. As the walls and silos that typically exist between teams within an organization are dismantled, a paradoxical benefit emerges: the more cross-functional transparency that exists, the greater the autonomy for rapid, decentralized decision-making. The key principles - which the starlings utilize - focus on overcoming 'interface failures' (ie. the points where the individuals'/teams' work touches one another's).
You may have noticed that Alignd is missing an “e.” It’s not by accident. We were inspired by a slide deck from our founding customer, BETA Technologies. Kyle Clark, the visionary founder of BETA, shared a page that simply said: “SMPLFY - 25% more efficient. 100% effective.” How much more can we do if we can do it more efficiently? Work smarter, not harder. As such, Alignd is 14.5% more efficient. What can you achieve if Alignd unlocks the same in your organization?
Inspiration and timeless insights on how progress really happens.
Authors Brian Moran and Michael Lennington explore the concept of accountability in their book Uncommon Accountability. They suggest it's time to move beyond the idea of "holding people accountable." Instead, they recommend a different perspective: “hold people capable.”
Adam Bouchard
Creating strategic clarity about the things that matter most is what drives progress.
Rich Price
In this episode, Will and Rich's guest is Mike Erwin, founder and Executive Director of Team Red, White & Blue (Team RWB) and co-author of LEAD YOURSELF FIRST by Bloomsbury Press (2017).
Rich Price
