Is your leadership team rowing in sync?
Imagine a rowing team where each person is paddling at a different rhythm. Or worse, in a different direction. That’s what it feels like when a leadership team lacks alignment.
As a senior leader, you might assume alignment is happening because your team attends the same meetings or shares common goals. But true alignment—on values, behaviors, and ways of working—doesn’t happen by accident. It happens by design.
It’s your responsibility as a leader to create the conditions for your leadership team to operate as one unified unit. That means intentionally aligning not only around strategy and results but also around how you lead together.
Here’s how high-performing teams do it.
-
Uncover the Misalignments That Are Slowing You Down
Many leadership teams operate with invisible tension: misaligned values, unspoken expectations, and contradictory behaviors. This creates confusion, erodes trust, and slows decision-making.
By assessing the values you personally hold, the culture you’re collectively creating, and the culture you aspire to lead, you can surface misalignments you didn’t know were there. The Leadership Team Values Assessment (LTVA), powered by Barrett Values Centre, is a practical, eye-opening tool that helps your leadership team:
This process helps your team:
- Identify where personal and organizational values are in conflict
- Spot disconnects between what you say you value and how you show up
- Name cultural blind spots that may be affecting team morale or performance
Once these gaps are visible, you can talk about them—and work together to shift them.
This isn’t just a reflective exercise. It’s a foundational step in creating a leadership culture that is intentional, aligned, and values-driven.
-
Turn Shared Intentions into Clear Commitments
Even when values are aligned, misfires can still happen. Why? Because every leader brings their own default ways of working: how they give feedback, make decisions, or handle conflict.
This is where Team Agreements come in.
Team Agreements are not fluffy feel-good statements. They’re explicit, practical commitments about how you will work together. When co-created, they clarify behaviour expectations and eliminate the guesswork.
They help your team:
- Reduce friction caused by unspoken norms
- Build psychological safety through shared practices
- Create consistency in how decisions and communication happen
Examples might include:
- We ask before assuming
- We approach mistakes with curiosity, not blame
- We say the hard things, directly and kindly
- We trust each others’ intent, even when we disagree on impact
- We start and end meetings on time.
- We don’t leave a meeting without knowing who is doing what by when.
- We don’t multitask during meetings.
- We pause when tensions run high to regroup, not react.
- We give each other permission to learn out loud.
- We stay open to feedback on how we’re working as a team.
- We check in on each other as people, not just as roles.
Agreements turn values into action. They make culture visible and repeatable.
-
Invest in Alignment Up Front
One of the most common pitfalls for leadership teams is assuming they’re aligned—on values, priorities, or even what a good decision looks like. But assumptions are expensive.
Teams often skip the uncomfortable (or time-consuming) conversations, only to spend far more time later untangling confusion, reworking decisions, or repairing trust.
We’ve seen this firsthand: the leadership teams that slow down to align are the ones who move faster and more effectively in the long run.
When a leadership team is truly aligned on what matters, how they behave, and how they lead together, they become a powerful force for clarity, trust, and momentum.
This kind of intentional alignment leads to:
- Faster, more confident decisions
- Less second-guessing, confusion, or rework
- Mutual accountability
- A leadership culture that the rest of the organization can trust and model
This is how leadership alignment becomes a competitive advantage—not just for your team, but for your entire company.
Alignment Isn’t a Luxury. It’s a Leadership Imperative.
If you want to lead a healthy, high-performing organization, don’t leave alignment to chance.
Start by making the invisible visible. Talk about values. Co-create agreements. And lead in one direction together.
