Making the Case for Alignment Mapping
Charting time, talent, & treasure for every strategic endeavor
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“Strategy manifests in coherent action.” (Alex Smith)
Running a school is difficult, challenging work, but it can be reduced to some basics. School leaders map time, talent, and treasure onto their schools’ existing strategic priorities, save some capacity for the inevitable daily emergencies that pop up, and navigate through the school year.
School leaders could think about their entire staff this way — each colleague has set hours, evolving skills and capacities, and technically, an hourly rate. With a time-talent-treasure map in mind, leaders could think about small teams or departments dedicated to specific functions. They could approach hiring season with this concept in mind instead of focusing exclusively on plugging one hole at a time. And, one hopes, they could apply such cartography to the space wherein Boards work to govern or influence Senior Leadership Teams.
Whether we are talking about an English Department or a Board itself, a perfect map would reveal a complete disbursement of all available time, talent, and treasure. The team would work at a brisk, though sustainable, pace to meet both the needs and aspirations within their purview, spending down the appropriately allocated budget. More often, the maps we work with resemble the Bed of Procrustes; we are either stretching to fit the mattress or lopping off legs dangling over the edge of the frame.
At a school, the elements of time, talent, and treasure are too often overstretched for the undisciplined reason of having too many priorities or too many people in a position to name what the priorities either are or seem to be. On the flip side, those elements are often underused for an equal and opposite lack of discipline: no clear priorities or too few people using their position or influence to set priorities.
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