Aligning Ambitions (Part 1)
Week of:
Structure for case studies entries:
Intro= what I’m about to talk about
Body= walking through the case
End= how this is a (tbd) Empathy story
I’ve worked on small, medium and enterprise projects. Hard products, SAAS products, etc., etc. So there are different types of ground we could cover. I’ll just start by telling you where we are; this case study takes place in an enterprise environment. And that means parallel paths.
To be successful in enterprise situations (not just being good at doing the work, but for the project to succeed) you have to deconstruct misconceptions internally while constructing a new, better, more aligned strategic vision supported by the external reality. And if you can engineer the pacing of those actions to gently guide your stakeholders through the perspective change without friction… that’s the dream. ← spoilers… this is the (tbd) Empathy bit.
THE BEGINNING
So you wake up one morning never having done anything to anybody to deserve it and an in-progress engineering-driven capability that’s nearing viability is unceremoniously plopped on your desk. Engineering, who we love, has come up with something but no one knows what it is supposed to be for on the front end… if they even understood the capability.
Deconstructing misconceptions starts with discovering misconceptions.
Step 1: Recognize the Existing Situation
Our first challenge is “simply” acknowledging the current state. We are dealing with a capability that is already in development, practically delivered. However, while it is nearing viability from a technical standpoint, it is essential to assess its alignment with broader strategic objectives. For this story- the idea is the feature will give us access to an unspeakable but impressive portion of our user-base largely spending their time off-platform.
A nice classic is in order– a quick retrospective, not a lot there this time around due to the above. And workshopping, bringing those stakeholders together and facilitating some difficult conversations around ownership/responsibility/and step 2. (tbd) Empathy Opportunity #1
Step 2: Addressing Prior Commitments
Now, we need to navigate the reality of an unaware product division having already committed resources elsewhere. This presented a significant hurdle as we sought to realign efforts and resources towards our strategic goals. It required delicate communication and negotiation to ensure everyone was on board with the new direction. That’s tough. (tbd) Empathy Opportunity #2
When we started doing projects like this one, we would say things like… oh we’re going to need executive buy-in for this with the idea that they might shield the project from disruptive forces (hilarious)… this never works. Every time I’ve seen this approach, the executive in question says- ok, you go get the buy-in and I’ll be on board. (tbd) Empathy Opportunity #3
(Re)constructing data-driven user-centered org-friendly no bullshit alignment
Ah. Biscuits. This is too long already. We’ll have to reconstruct next case study “Aligning Ambitions Part 2”
Here’s a teaser if you’re into that sort of thing: “Ok then… we recruit. I remember sitting in a meeting nervous to ask SME to look over what we intended to do once; they had a project that seemed similar but was at a much smaller scope and that appearance of redundancy is…”
Oooo. Intriguing. 👀
But for Part 1: For (tbd) Empathy
Opportunity #1: When we go looking for understanding, we should not divorce the knowledge from the knowledge creators. I’d love to build this thought out as (tbd) Empathy progresses but for now the brief is: snoop on those decks. Get some activity data and write down names and departments. We can use our authentic interest in the work created by our colleagues to connect with them in a better than transactional way.
Opportunity #2: One of my mentors (surprise! I’ve been learning from you all along!) once attributed our success to not defending our expectations. Was it a trauma response from near constant project turbulence? You betcha. But it’s also a really neat skill to have. We can endeavor to accept new information as informing, not confronting our current direction. On the flip side, we can also be honest with ourselves about how tough that is and give people a chance to react to the disruption.
Opportunity #3: No comment and many thoughts on why this champion has yet to emerge, but I’m personally fine with ‘go see what the community thinks’ in this situation. The primary reasons cited for getting that buy-in is that it’ll be faster if you can just tell people they have to. The truth is even when we can lightly coerce our colleagues with the idea of a bigger, scarier bully behind us… we shouldn’t. Strong-arming our peers undermines our collaboration by compromising their ability to trust us– first by looking foolish enough to underestimate what they have to offer and then not being transparent with our own fears that drove us to shield ourselves in the first place.
Okie doke, artichoke. More casual soapboxing later.
Thanks, Holli.