Stakeholder Alignment

70% of all transformations fail to achieve their full potential, according to McKinsey’s research. Moreover, in my experience, most change efforts take longer and cost more money than anticipated.  I believe that many reasons, including lack of leadership, inadequate resources, and failure to stay the course, are to be blamed. However, one critical factor that sticks out for me early in the transformation journey is building a guiding coalition and aligning all stakeholders.     With a clear vision in mind, stakeholder alignment is the first step in moving towards change objectives. The stakeholders are the decision-makers, champions, and implementers, and they must be aligned on the shared goals and shared beliefs of the transformation.  It is impossible to lead the whole change process by a few, and therefore it is vital to building a coalition to steer change. The alliance should be made up of a range of skills, experience, and people from different business areas to maximize its effectiveness. In addition, the coalition help to communicate vision throughout the organization, delegate tasks, and ensure support for the change.  Through stakeholder alignment, organizations build a culture of trust, cooperation, and collaboration. This activity makes winning teams collaborate, complement, and drive each other to work harder and achieve change objectives.  Without this critical step, all activities are bound to be isolated, ineffective, and futile.