Alignment and Agreement, According to Dogs

II pitched my dog a walk. She said the plan lacked alignment and declined to move.

Which is funny, because moments earlier, we'd both enthusiastically agreed that a walk was a great idea. Tail wagging, downward dog pose, all that.

Then we got outside, she remembered it was super humid and killed the plan on the spot.

My dog's stubbornness aside, she had a point. There's something to be said about the difference between alignment and agreement.

This comes up a lot in internal and change communications, because companies often assume that if their audience agrees with them, they have a way forward.

Not necessarily.

Alignment means people don't just say yes. It means doing the hard work to understand the conditions, map out roles and messages, and find a way to move forward together when it's time to actually walk (pun intended).

My dog agreed to the plan, but she never aligned with it. The second conditions changed, so did her commitment.

The good news? Humans are usually easier to align than dogs. That way you can actually build the conditions that gets everyone moving forward together. 🐾