70% of transformations fail. Yours doesn’t have to!

1. Strategic Goals

What is your organisation trying to achieve (e.g. faster time to value delivery, focus on customer satisfaction, data-driven decision making, introduce AI)?

2. Ways of Working

This category sounds broad because it is! Draw out how all the functions (really) work to get from organisational vision/strategy to portfolio and product strategy and delivery. Overlay the approaches from different functions to show how they impact each other. What does continuous improvement and optimisation look like? How does marketing integrate with product development? How do legal and compliance contribute? Map out the full picture of how teams, and teams-of-teams, work.

What values and principles guide the people? What are the cultural norms and mindset that shape how work gets done?

What incentives guide behaviour? What behaviour gets rewarded (whether explicit in terms of bonuses, success measures, performance reviews or implicit in terms of what actually gets noticed and celebrated or who gets interesting work or promotions)?

3. Decision Making

This rubric encompasses the frameworks, processes, and accountabilities that enable clearly established priorities, decision-making, and the flexibility to adjust when necessary at all levels. It also includes governance: How does leadership get involved in the ways of working and how do things get prioritised, funded, reviewed, signed off on, and measured?

4. Capabilities

What capabilities do you need to deliver high-value outcomes? This can include skills, practises, and tools as well as the roles that come together to encompass these capabilities.

5. Collaboration Structure

How do people work together today? What organisational silos and structures enable or hinder teams to work together? Is there clarity on who is responsible for what? Any gaps or duplication causing friction?

A few points to keep in mind as you fill out the canvas:

These boxes are deceptively small and simple, but remember A LOT goes on in each area.

Because these sections can rapidly expand, especially once you begin to invite others to contribute, you may want to use a whiteboarding tool like Miro or Mural to facilitate collaboration.

Your goal is to bring together a holistic view of the system to understand cause and effect better. Many pain points go unresolved because we don’t have the remit to solve problems outside our vertical (functional) or horizontal (product/service) sphere of influence in the system. Looking at how value gets created in your organisation can help you and your peers dig into (and eventually solve) root causes together.

Tips to help you get the most out of the Practice Compass

Don’t get too intimidated by the blank page. Your first goal is to capture your perspective of the current state. But as soon as possible, invite a representative group to help you flesh out the complete picture of where you are today.

Once you’ve co-created a full picture of the ecosystem with your representative group, highlight friction and pain points in achieving your goals and working effectively, but don’t forget to highlight what works exceptionally well, too.

Prioritise areas for improvement to help you achieve your strategic goals.

Now, you can use the canvas to design a blueprint for your unique target operating model. What helps your unique organisation improve how you create value? What superpowers can you leverage? Here is a handy list of 10 strengths for successful transformation. We don’t recommend you simply copy and paste someone else’s model, but rather consider what principles and patterns empower organisations to transform their ability to compete in today’s VUCA environment and win at reaching the strategic goals you are pursuing. This could be something like “do more with less,” “accelerate speed to value,” “become more customer-centred or product-led” or “integrate AI into our offering.”

Experiment with the new approach, pilot the ideas to see how it works in real life in your context. Iron out the kinks. What enablement do the teams and leaders need? What mindset needs to shift? What skills development do you need to invest in? Share learnings.

Much like a product is never done, your operating model is also a living system that will continually evolve and needs to be nurtured to meet changing demands and new capabilities.

Give it a try and let us know what happens—we can’t wait to hear how it goes! And if you ever get stuck or feel like you need some support in using the canvas to its full capacity, don’t hesitate to get in touch.