Every organization faces challenges. It’s easy to point fingers or blame external forces, but usually when problems persist, it’s because there’s a lack of internal alignment. And that’s nobody else’s responsibility than leadership’s. As the saying goes, “A fish rots from the head.” Leadership sets the tone, but addressing misalignment requires introspection, and that’s hard, for lots of reasons.

What Causes Misalignment?

At its core, misalignment happens when leadership isn’t truly living the organization’s stated values. This can happen incrementally over time without keen awareness… until it is obvious. At that point, there’s real conflict and mistrust throughout an organization, making it harder to face. Values that are mainly expressed at the surface level but disconnected from the authentic beliefs of leadership erodes trust swiftly. Rifts begin to cascade throughout the organization. Staff, customers, and people in your community all want to believe you when you say something. You can feel the tension when the trust isn’t there. Imagine a company that claims innovation as a core value but stifles creativity with rigid approval processes. The gap between words and actions breeds distrust, both internally and externally.

Design projects are a perfect Trojan horse for meeting this moment head on. The process of design is the process of telling our story — whether it’s our brand story or an annual report. We use our design projects to create the opportunity for building trust, clarity, and alignment. It’s a ripe moment to pair the creative process — which can be beautifully vulnerable — with the hard, internal work of organizational self-awareness.

This deeper work involves understanding your brand’s DNA: your mission, vision, values, and culture. It means a process of uncovering and documenting who you are and committing to embodying those truths. Only with this clarity can you create authentic, lasting change.

Clarity as the Foundation

Self-awareness isn’t just a buzzword — it’s critical. When you deeply understand your mission, values, and culture, your brand gains internal clarity, which naturally informs  external — and internal — expression. This clarity ensures that your actions and words are authentic and credible, building your most valuable currency: trust. Without trust, audiences will see through even the most polished campaigns.

For example, consider a brand overhaul that reflects an organization’s true values. This isn’t about inventing a new identity; it’s about bringing your existing one into sharper focus. Authenticity ensures consistency — when you say and do the same thing, your brand resonates more deeply. That’s the thing to realize. We talk about design therapy, and that’s all we mean — that you are uncovering and stepping more into the truth, not creating something completely different and new for the sake of a shine.

Clarity is everything. And at the heart of clarity lives truth. When you know who you are and can walk the walk — your mission, values, and culture — everything clicks into place and momentum builds quickly. Your actions match your words, your brand resonates, and trust grows.

Alignment and Documentation Hold It Together

Achieving alignment starts with conversations. Leadership and teams must come together to share insights, agree on priorities, and align on purpose. This is not an easy process — it requires facilitation, trust, vulnerability, and often a third-party perspective to untangle competing ideas and find common ground. It’s tough to do this by yourself (again, another similarity to therapy, or surgery, for that matter).

Once you get some clarity and alignment, you have to write it down, document it.  There must be toolkits and guidelines that become part of your operations that codify your brand, self-definition, and orientation to who your audiences are and what they want. This work should guide everything from hiring decisions to product development to training, culture, and more.

Think of documentation as a lighthouse — it ensures your team can navigate confidently in the right direction, even when the path ahead is unclear.

This is where the magic happens. You don’t have to remember anything because it’s right there for everyone to see and it’s rooted in the most foundational expression of who you are as an organization. You have clarity, you start to say the same things over and over and get alignment with your team and your communications. The process is transformative because you end up with a brand — a clear self-definition — that not only looks cohesive and true, but feels authentic to you and everyone else.

Why It Matters More Than Ever

We live in a time of widespread cynicism and systemic cruelty. Authenticity isn’t just a competitive edge — it’s a necessity. Organizations that align their actions and messaging with their professed values can build credibility, trust, and loyalty in an increasingly noisy marketplace, whether you’re looking to compete for customers or you’re looking to build toward greater justice. It all takes trust and integrity.

Before you invest in external changes, we challenge you to do the inner work. Ask yourself: Are we clear on who we are? Are we aligned internally? Are we prepared to live our values authentically, day in and day out?