Team Alignment:
Getting all your leaders in a row

by Judith Newland, Jackie Lauer and Capt Margaret Kavanagh

Most human endeavours involve some degree of coordinated action among groups of individuals.
Initially, this was a small group of hunters cooperating to hunt down prey. Now, the successful management of large corporations or national economies is dependent on the input of potentially thousands of individuals. How do you align the actions of all those individuals in such a way that the larger organization succeeds?

Lack of alignment leads to paralysis. When organizations depend on the efforts of tens, hundreds or even thousands of people, it only takes each of them to be pulling in a different direction by one degree for the group to be going nowhere. In multi-layered organizations the dilution of direction is often such that it is no longer possible to tell if everyone is going in the same direction. In addition, people’s behaviour is most strongly influenced by how they are rewarded.

A change in strategy at the top, not followed up by an alignment of reward systems, will leave most of the organization not only doing things “the way we have always done them” but also believing that they are doing what is required of them.

So what exactly is alignment? I am aligned with you when – in a given set of circumstances – I would likely make the same decision as you without you being there or being consulted. I would make the same or similar judgements about the relative priorities of my needs versus yours, and I know what information is important to share with you. The way we make choices or decisions about how we will act in any given set of circumstances is based on what we know or believe to be true, what we consider to be important and the final destination we have in mind.

Consequently, to achieve coordinated action or alignment among large, diverse and/or geographically dispersed groups, there must be some commonality of assumptions, values and vision.

Alignment is not teamwork. It need not involve shared resources or accountabilities. It is all team members being accountable for moving the organization towards the future designed for it by the team, namely the vision. Often in large organizations, the work of different functions or sectors may appear to have no direct interdependencies.

Employees may think that since they have a different set of stakeholders than others in the organization, and they don’t provide a service or product to each other, they don’t have to worry about being aligned. But while employees within an organization may not directly influence the day-to-day success of each other, they need to be sure they are not, in some way, interfering with the success of the whole.

Alignment is not agreement. Although they may genuinely invite input and criticism of their ideas, leaders like to be agreed with. Leaders and their teams also prefer to avoid conflict. If plans and ideas were self-implementing this would be fine. Agreement on a ‘good idea’ is not a commitment to do anything about it. Alignment is about precisely that: commitment. When we begin to put resources on the table, to negotiate timelines, and agree on relative priorities (giving up bits of ‘my empire’ for the greater good) then we begin to create alignment.

For an example of alignment, consider the Canadian Forces Health Services Group, an organization responsible for the provision of health care to the Canadian Forces that since 2000 has been involved in a major transformation (Project Rx2000). Like most public sector change, it is being managed as a project alongside the pressures of day-to-day work. The leadership team is made up of more than 20 functional authorities, making alignment both more difficult and more important. Each member of the leadership team has health care-related responsibilities as well as specific Project Rx2000 responsibilities.

During the summer of 2004, Rx2000 reached the end of the definition phase and was preparing for full project implementation. This is always a hurdle for projects – those who have excelled at strategizing, theorizing and developing models will likely be less enthusiastic about the ‘devil’s in the details’ approach needed for implementation. This is more complex for the military because of the annual posting (re-location) cycle – those tasked with implementation were not necessarily those who had been involved in the development of the solution.

At a leadership retreat in August 2004, the aim was to align the new team to be ready to successfully implement the change. During the definition phase, the expression of differing ideas and concepts is not necessarily a barrier to progress.

However, when you embark on a multi-million dollar, publicly funded, nationwide implementation, there is alignment or failure. The real power in this alignment activity came when the executive team, with the assistance of the consultants, translated into some detail who was going to do what.

Most significant initiatives in organizations are not entirely from a position of choice but are nonetheless vital. A lot of time and effort is usually spent trying to align actions at the point of implementation – i.e., getting people to change what they do. Remember: behaviour is based on what we know/believe, what we value and where we want to go. True alignment begins here. If I share your beliefs about the need for change and your commitment to a vision of a future state, I can decide for myself what to do. Lack of alignment lets Resistors move to that delightful country, ‘denial’, keeping their heads down and continuing with the status quo. Early Adopters will rush into action, each pursuing their individual vision of the future. Accomodators will wait to be told specifically what to do… and so on and so on.

The organization will be spending financial and human resources to ‘run on the spot’!
Even during a project or change initiative, your environment will continue to evolve in ways not planned for or expected, and implementers need to be able to make local course-corrections, knowing everyone is still heading for the same ‘home port’. In real terms, the organization can keep moving towards its goals without the leader having to manage minutiae.

Now how do I get my team to alignment? One key point is to understand and listen for the difference between agreement and commitment. For example, when someone says, “yes, I think we should do that,” you have agreement. When they say, “I will provide people/funds/space so that we can do that,” you have commitment. The other key point is to take the time at the beginning to reach a shared understanding and commitment so once action begins real progress can be made.

The overall process has a number of steps:
·     Make sure everyone has the same data. Leaders beware here: you deal with strategic data that comes from above and outside your organization all the time. It is so familiar you hardly notice it any more, but do not assume everyone else knows it too…they don’t! Separate ‘what we know’ about our environment from what we believe or assume.
·     Establish a shared picture of where we are headed and what it will look like when we get there.
·     Have the tough conversations. This is where most organizations and most leaders sadly fall down. They fail to answer the difficult questions, which are the ones that lead to true alignment.
·     Identify the roles and responsibilities of members of the team, including the leader.
·     Ask each member of the team to state what their areas of focus will be and what requests they have to make of the leader and other members of the team to fulfill their responsibilities.
·     Negotiate. Continue until resources are on the table and agreements have been negotiated among the members of the team.
·     Renegotiate the role of the leader. Given what we are trying to achieve, what can the leader expect from you, the team, and what can you expect from the leader in return. Include details of what that will look like (why will we have meetings, what will they look like – how will we know when alignment is drifting).

Finally, getting your team to alignment is about leading them through the tough conversations.
It is not a comfortable process – nor is it necessarily a rapid one. Investment in alignment at the outset will pay dividends in implementation whether you are leading tens or thousands of people or managing a budget of thousands or millions of dollars.

In the words of the leader, MGen Mathieu: “As employees struggle with the impact of the change agenda on them and those they lead, they look to their seniors for inspiration. Consistency in their day-to-day interactions with the multiple functional authorities is one of many force multipliers.
Thus alignment within the senior team is fundamental to effect successful, lasting, system-wide change.”



Judith Newland works with leaders and leadership teams. Jackie Lauer is a change management consultant and executive coach. Both are partners in Axletree Consulting (www.axletree.com). Capt (N) Margaret Kavanagh, M.D., is Deputy Commander of the Canadian Forces Health Services.