“Extreme Alignment” By Dave Hanna, HPO Global Alliance

Consider this question: what good does it do to redesign an organization if the changes don’t enable it to survive?

So often we spend our time trying to reshape our organization’s culture, or restructure, or to fix the crisis of the day. But how often do we examine the whole system of organization in its ever-changing competitive environment and then adapt appropriately to ensure our survival?

The importance of distinguishing between these two objectives was demonstrated to me at a conference some years ago. A presenter was sharing his company’s experiences with redesigning its operation to compete better against Japanese firms. Following many popular design trends of the day, he outlined how his company had restructured into a team system, initiated a new compensation plan, written a new mission statement, and increased its training budget. At the end of his presentation, I asked this presenter, “How has your redesign work helped you compete better against the Japanese firms?”

His answer shocked me, “Well, you can’t really compete against the Japanese.”

What good, then, was all of this organization design work?

A Scientific Metaphor

Recent research in the field of capillaries and cavities is a good metaphor for aligning today’s organizations. Materials with tiny capillaries and cavities are used widely in filtration and separation of various elements to purify water and other substances.

Up to now, charcoal carbon filters have proven to be the most effective at removing undesirable elements from water. But the molecular structure of carbon is a blend of cavities (cave-like chambers that trap undesirable elements) and capillaries (channels that permit water to be passed on).

One difficulty with the charcoal carbon filter is that all elements must pass through its slow, somewhat meandering process to deliver the desired output.

Until recently it has been impossible to create artificial capillaries with atomic-scale precision. But researchers Radha Boya and Nobel laureate Andre Geim have made the impossible possible. These researchers have removed strips in graphene (a flat layer of carbon one atom thick) to create Nano channels. These channels can carry fluids or gasses, while filtering out contaminants like salt, viruses, and bacteria that easily attach to these liquids but are too big to fit through the 0.3 nanometer channel.

Stack enough sheets of graphene on top of each other with nano channels precisely removed in each one, and you have a designed capillary that is a faster, more direct conduit to allow the desired element to pass through while filtering out undesired elements. But the channel must be designed to be “extremely aligned” to the properties of the materials that will pass through it and to deliver the precise desired output. Approximations won't get the job done.

What intrigues me about this study of atomic-scale design is the functional capacity to channel some elements in a targeted direction and to filter out undesirable elements. This is actually a very serviceable definition for designing an organizational culture. Consider for a moment what you might accomplish if you could channel the delivery of your products or services to be “extremely aligned” with stakeholder needs while filtering out distracting “impurities.” The more challenging your environmental context, the greater the need for “extreme” alignment with your stakeholders.

“Good Enough” is Not “Extreme Alignment”

For instance, crafting a company strategy or mission statement is an approximate alignment with the organizational need for “Purpose.” Extreme alignment means that individuals in all areas and at all levels intrinsically channel their efforts to fulfill the purpose. Such actions filter out dysfunctional and distracting traditions, obsolete assumptions, or ideas like “we are good enough.”

Similarly, an organization chart may be in approximate alignment with “accountability.” But “atomic-scale precision” alignment means that individuals, regardless of where they fit in the organization chart, have the knowledge, skills, and commitment to solve any daily problem they face in their work.

And so forth.

A word of caution: the terms “extreme alignment” and “atomic-scale precision” should not be interpreted as a need for traditional re-engineering or the use of organizational micrometers. These labels drive one to think organizational improvements can be accomplished by the better design of technical things only. Redesigning a technical thing focuses only on that thing’s function. Synergy focuses on “intangibles” such as relationships between people in stakeholder groups in the ecosystem. Extreme alignment requires both technical advances and greater synergy among human stakeholders

For example: because people and their environments are so diverse, atomic-scale precision may mean that no two teams are designed exactly the same; leadership, support, decisiveness, and objectives may need to be different for different groups and individuals. Policies or grand organizational schematics alone cannot deliver atomic-scale precision of relationships.

What This Looks Like in the Real World: The Stora Enso Company

Stora Enso is generally regarded as the oldest industrial company in the world. A document in 1288 first mentioned the existence of Stora Kopperberg, a Swedish copper mining enterprise. In medieval times this company supplied copper for many purposes, most notably the construction of ships and cathedral steeples throughout Europe.

Through the centuries as natural resources waned and technology and lifestyles evolved, Stora’s business has adapted successfully from mining to pulp and paper manufacturing and wood products today. It merged with Finland’s Enso Oyj in 1998 and today is the world’s second largest pulp and paper manufacturer. Through each of its adaptive phases, Stora Enso has revised its purpose, established a steady state to produce new products, mobilized resources, developed complex skills in new businesses and synergized with new partners to enable it to stay on top.

The natural resources in Stora’s 13th century copper mines have long since been exhausted, but the company lives on, with 30,000 associates in 85 units on all continents still making a significant contribution to the quality of life for many of us.

As Stora Enso’s experiences show: “extreme alignment” and “atomic-scale design” of organizations must be focused uncompromisingly on the whole system’s survival and the required human interactions that will sustain it.

A Practical Graphic Illustration of Extreme Alignment

The output of this “capillary” is a product or service that fulfills the stakeholder’s needs. Any function or activity that tangibly contributes value to this output is channeled through the capillary. Some of these might include:

•   Timely and quality interactions with the stakeholders
•   Creation of products and/or services that the stakeholder values
•   Organizing processes and systems from support functions to core operations, down to individual tasks to deliver the required outputs

The new design must filter out any “impurities” or distractions that might compromise the desired output. Such factors are illustrated in the gray elements of the graphic. For example:

•   Current job procedures and work systems may need to be stopped or revised.
•  “Top-down” leadership preferences may need to be redesigned to permit skilled, responsible decisions at the point of action.
•   Functional silos may need to be supplemented by cross-functional structures for work that requires a high level of collaboration.
•   Policies or operating rules may need to be revised.
•   Work culture norms, such as such beliefs that “we’re good enough” or “Not Invented Here” may need to be eliminated or upgraded.

The new design must be supported by training and development systems to equip associates to function competently and effectively in the new organization. Some examples:

•   If associates are expected to be able to solve any daily problem they face, they must be given the knowledge, tools, and skills to do so.
•   If teamwork and collaboration are imperative for some tasks, some training in collaborative skills might be warranted.
•   If high flexibility and responsiveness are required, the development of multi-skilled associates has proven to be essential.
•   Most likely, some new processes and systems between the organization and some stakeholders will need to be designed jointly.

Conclusion

With the need for extreme alignment in our heads, and with a commitment to ensure our organization survives all external challenges, the process I have outlined here gives us fuel to examine our current cultural underlying beliefs and behaviors and see that they do not “tag along” with the improvements we aim to fulfill.

Questions, comments or for more understanding just comment below and we can talk.

A very deep indepth white paper can be found here https://hpoglobalalliance.com/part-i-what-is-extreme-alignment-and-what-difference-does-it-make/high-performance-organizations/