Strategy = Angst

Alignment is an essential component of teamwork. Your team members might be working hard individually, but if they’re pulling in opposite directions, there will be no forward motion.

When you're working on something with many parts or steps, simply aligning around the tasks involved can be challenging — like deciding who will do what by when. But when you’re trying to align strategically, things become exponentially more difficult.

This is because strategy is about the future and things outside our control.

Designing a winning strategy means picking a market to play in and developing a theory about how to be better, faster, or cheaper than your competition. All strategies carry a degree of uncertainty. Because of this, anxiety — perhaps even dread — is baked in. In other words, strategy = angst.

What gets labeled “strategic planning” is often operational — coordinating the tasks and activities we’ll do in the next quarter or year. In my experience, teams often unconsciously supplant strategic planning with operational planning because the latter is about things within our control and therefore less emotionally taxing.

On the other hand, radical alignment is achieved when strategy and operations come together into a single, precise focus of team energy.

A common way to align a team strategically is behind a single heroic and inspiring leader — Elon Musk and Steve Jobs come to mind. Unfortunately, this solution is primarily available to charismatic and narcissistic people, which means it can be also used to sell BS — Adam Neumann and Elizabeth Holmes come to mind.

I’ve fallen for this kind of BS a few times, both in the startup tech world and as part of a new-age cult that promised to change the world. It didn’t go well for me or the organization.

If you want to achieve strategic alignment in a healthy, real, and collaborative way (what most leaders want), you have to lean into difficult conversations. Whether you like it or not, you must embrace angst.

This is what makes Margot Robbie’s question so powerful. “Barbie” director Greta Gerwig says Robbie would close every meeting with the studio by giving studio executives space to share concerns or feedback they hadn’t yet shared.

This question is brilliant because it leans into the angst. Therefore, it leans into alignment.

There is no strategy without angst, and there is no alignment without difficult conversations.

— Bob Gower
Transforming Organizations Through Radical Alignment

PS: If you want to explore practical ways to lean into discomfort, a new cohort of my course Radically Aligned Teams starts 10/24/23. Reserve your spot today.

PPS: As Principal for Organizational Effectiveness at changeforce.ai, I’m dedicated to helping create high-performing organizations. Hit reply to set up a meeting to learn more about our offerings.

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