Giving teams relative autonomy by operating a system using subtle control means we have to devise ways of creating alignment within our organization. If our team is to be successful, it has to understand its purpose and how it fits with the rest of the group.
The following diagram shows a typical organizational hierarchy of strategic intent:
An organization's mission or purpose is the reason it exists. It rarely changes and is often defined in a single sentence. We mentioned a few prominent companies and their purpose in Chapter 5, Bootstrap Teams with Liftoffs; here are those examples again:
- Google: To organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful
- Tesla: To accelerate the world's transition to sustainable energy
- Kickstarter: To help bring creative projects to life
An organization...