Let me start with something I’ve learned the hard way—over and over again.
In every venture I’ve helped build or support, whether it’s a lean tech startup or a growing service firm, I run into the same frustrating truth:
Most employees—smart, well-meaning, hard-working people—can’t tell you what their company is really about.
- They can tell you what they do.
- They might even be good at it.
But ask them why the company exists. Ask them what the mission is, or where the business is trying to go. Ask them to give you a 30-second elevator pitch. Odds are, they’ll hesitate—or give you five different answers.
And that’s not just a messaging problem.
- That’s a leadership problem.
- That’s a systems problem.
- That’s an alignment problem.
Who Owns Alignment?
Here’s the issue: in most companies, no one really owns alignment.
- Not the CEO, who’s too busy juggling investors, markets, and firefighting.
- Not the COO, who’s keeping the ship operational.
- Not HR, whose plate is already full with hiring, retention, compliance.
So what happens?
The why gets lost. The how becomes fragmented. Teams drift.
Everyone stays busy—but they’re not necessarily moving in the same direction.
If you're lucky, you catch it early. If you're not, it starts to cost you:
Missed goals. Slower execution. Duplicated work. Burnout. Turnover. A culture that feels more transactional than inspired.
And yet we keep treating alignment as if it will emerge organically from strategy decks, onboarding sessions, or annual town halls.
It won’t.
Introducing the CAO: Chief Alignment Officer
That’s why I believe it’s time for a new kind of executive—one whose sole focus is this exact issue.
Call them the Chief Alignment Officer (CAO).
A role designed to make sure the business’s vision, strategy, culture, and daily execution are actually pointing in the same direction. A role to ensure that employees aren’t just productive—they’re purpose-aligned. That their work connects back to something coherent, strategic, and shared.
That someone, somewhere, is making sure the big picture isn’t getting lost in the busyness of the day-to-day.
But Don’t We Already Have These Roles?
Some will say, “Isn’t that the CEO’s job?”
In theory, yes.
In practice, no.
CEOs often set the vision—but who keeps it alive after the all-hands meeting?
Who checks that the product roadmap, the sales playbook, and the hiring strategy are telling the same story? Who ensures the metrics we track actually reinforce the culture and strategy we claim to care about?
Some forward-thinking CMOs and Chiefs of Staff have stepped into this space informally. But alignment is too important to leave to side projects or overlapping responsibilities.
- It needs a name.
- It needs a seat at the table.
- It needs to be someone’s job.
What a CAO Does (and Why It Matters)
A good CAO isn’t just a cheerleader or internal comms expert. They’re a systems thinker. A pattern recognizer. A connector of dots.
They ask hard questions like:
- Do our teams share a common definition of success?
- Are our OKRs actually aligned—or just parallel ambitions?
- Do employees understand how their role supports the strategy?
- Are we reinforcing our values in how we hire, promote, and lead?
They facilitate realignment when drift happens (because it always does).
They design rituals—offsites, retros, reviews—that embed clarity and cohesion.
They make the invisible visible: the unspoken assumptions, the siloed incentives, the misaligned narratives.
And most of all, they keep the “why” alive.
The Risk of Not Having One
Here’s what happens when you don’t have someone playing this role:
- You lose speed.
- You lose clarity.
- You lose trust.
- People work hard, but not smart.
- Teams pull in different directions.
- Leaders repeat themselves over and over because nothing sticks.
And then, one day, someone says, “We’ve outgrown our culture,” or “We’ve lost focus,” or “I don’t know what we’re doing anymore.”
But the truth is: the problem wasn’t growth. It was misalignment. And it was preventable.
Final Thought
Alignment isn’t a one-time project. It’s not something you fix with a kickoff or a new Miro board.
It’s an ongoing leadership discipline. And in the complexity of today’s fast-moving businesses, it needs a champion.
The Chief Alignment Officer is not a luxury. In many companies, it might just be the missing piece.
We spend so much time on productivity, on velocity, on “shipping fast.” But what if the real competitive advantage wasn’t speed—but shared direction?
Want to continue this conversation?
I’m exploring this idea further and gathering real-world examples of how alignment is (or isn’t) working inside startups, scaleups, and mission-driven orgs. If this resonates—or if you’ve played this role informally—I’d love to hear your story.
