— A Leadership Reflection on Purpose, Alignment, and Impact
It was a usual start to the day, except that this wasn’t an ordinary day. The chairs were neatly arranged, the projector was already humming, and there was an anticipatory energy in the room. I had not originally planned to be here. My schedule suggested I’d leave after reviewing the progress with my team the previous evening. But something told me to stay—maybe curiosity, maybe intuition. I wanted to witness not just what would be presented, but how it would be understood and why it mattered.
The event was a strategic meet, involving different functional groups tasked with shaping the organization’s roadmap for the upcoming year. Each group had invested significant time preparing their presentations. The atmosphere was charged with confidence, anticipation, and a touch of competitiveness. Everyone was ready. Or so it seemed.
As the sessions began, the group representatives took the floor, one after another. The slides were well-designed, the points logically sequenced, and the action plans bold. To a passive observer, it might have looked like a success already—clear goals, defined activities, and deadlines. But I wasn’t there to applaud structure. I was there to question substance. So, instead of diving into their action plans, I asked a simple yet powerful question:
That’s when I noticed the first crack.
The teams had passionately described the road ahead, but when asked about the starting line, there was silence—or worse, vague assumptions. Not one group had quantified their current standing. There was no baseline, no metric, no snapshot of present reality. And without that, even the best strategy becomes like navigating without a compass.
You can’t measure progress without knowing where you begin. You can’t celebrate milestones unless you’ve mapped your coordinates.
The next layer of the illusion became visible when I dissected their action items.
“We plan to improve response time,”
“We will streamline reporting,”
“We aim to reduce errors in documentation…”
At first glance, these seemed admirable. But a deeper look revealed they were simply part of the routine job profile—day-to-day operational responsibilities dressed up as strategic breakthroughs.
The “extra mile” they were claiming was, in reality, the minimum expected standard.
This kind of rebranding is dangerous. It blurs the line between performance and compliance. It rewards the obvious and leaves true innovation starved of attention. Worst of all, it cultivates a culture where mediocrity is mistaken for achievement.
Then came the more concerning realization.
Each group had drafted its own plan in isolation. There were no interlinkages, no joint accountability, no touchpoints between departments. One team’s output was another team’s input, but no one had discussed it.
As a result:
When silos plan independently, you don’t build a strategy—you build parallel empires. And no matter how solid each empire is, they collapse when they try to connect without alignment.
And finally—the most critical oversight.
All the groups had ambitious plans. But none of the plans answered this:
👉 “How will this help us grow revenue?”
👉 “How will this improve customer experience?”
👉 “How will this make us more cost-effective or sustainable?”
There was no line of sight from effort to outcome. No equation that justified the resource investment in terms of business results. Strategy, at its core, is about creating value—for customers, for shareholders, for people. If your plan doesn’t link to a real outcome, it remains a task list, not a strategy.
As I left the room after the meet, I was both concerned and enlightened. Concerned at how easily strategic vocabulary can mask operational thinking. Enlightened because these were not failures, but lessons.
Here’s what I took away:
1. Measure Before You Move
You can’t set a destination if you don’t know your starting point. Every strategy must begin with a clear understanding of “where we are.” Measurement is not just data—it’s clarity.
2. Routine ≠ Strategy
Doing your job well is commendable. But let’s not confuse operational discipline with strategic excellence. Strategy is about change, value creation, and moving the business forward—not maintaining the status quo.
3. Alignment is the True Engine of Execution
Brilliant plans fail when they’re not aligned. Cross-functional collaboration, interdependency mapping, and shared goals are not afterthoughts—they are prerequisites.
4. Connect to the Core Purpose
If a plan doesn’t impact revenue, cost, customer, or long-term vision—it may not be worth doing. Every initiative must answer the “so what?” that matters to the business.
Many times, organizations get busy being busy. Presentations look sharp, dashboards are colourful, and meetings feel productive. But beneath all that, the question remains:
“Are we solving what really matters?”
True strategy starts not with answers, but with the right questions. And the most powerful of them all is:
“What is our core purpose, and how are we aligning our skills, systems, and strategy to serve it?”
