Now, in Post 3, I want to talk about alignment, especially in high-stakes public projects.
Earlier this year, I was invited to support a strategic alignment session for a major government programme in mainland Europe. It was a pivotal moment; new leadership, competing priorities, and 18 months of drift in what should have been a flagship project.
What made this particularly challenging was the dual layer of politics: the kind with a small p (stakeholders, personalities, influence), and the kind with a capital P (cabinet visibility, ministerial deadlines, public funding scrutiny). You have to work with both, but you cannot confuse them.
Working with government teams is different from working with bureaucratic private organisations. The constraints are real. Budgets are more rigid, media exposure is constant, and career civil servants often have different levers of motivation and influence. But the mission-driven aspect can also be incredibly powerful.
We brought together leaders from multiple ministries, delivery agencies, and advisory firms. Over two days, we unpacked the assumptions, identified systemic blockers, and mapped the web of relationships influencing progress.
Here’s the truth: that kind of progress only happened because we were in the room together. In person. Focused. No distractions. No screen fatigue. Just real, human dialogue and a shared sense of urgency.
The alignment we achieved face to face created the foundation for a highly effective virtual cadence in the weeks that followed. And when the next inflection point came, we came together again because sometimes, in-person presence is what unlocks progress.
In public sector work, alignment isn’t optional. It’s everything.
And sometimes, the difference between a delayed headline and a delivered programme is getting the right people in the room, talking about what really matters.
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