Purpose
Clarity about why the business exists and what guides its decisions.
What are we here to achieve for the customer?
The OAI Model™
See the business
as a whole.
A practical business alignment framework.
The Five-Stage Connected Structure
Click any stage to see its place in the connected business.
01 · Customer Value
Every business exists to serve its customer.
Customer Value gives the business a shared point of reference for its decisions, priorities and work.
What matters to the customer your business exists to serve?
Explore Customer Value ↓The stages describe a connected business. Each connects with the others and supports continued Customer Value.
Stage 01 · Customer Value
Customer Value.
Every business exists to serve its customer.
Understanding what matters to the customer gives the business a shared point of reference for its priorities, decisions and work.
The connections within the business matter because they affect what the customer receives. The Core Four and The Seven help leaders look at those connections in everyday practice.
What matters to the customer your business exists to serve, and how well are you delivering it?
Stage 02 · The Core Four
The Core Four.
Purpose, People, Process and Performance work together around Customer Value. Looking at their connections helps leaders understand the business as a whole.
People
People bring knowledge, capability and judgement to the work.
What do people need to understand and do their work well?
Process
The way work is designed, connected and carried out.
How does the work actually happen?
Performance
Understanding results alongside the work and conditions that produce them.
What are the results telling us, and what else do we need to understand?
Stage 03 · The Seven
The Seven.
Part of the work.
Shared practices bring the connections into everyday business. Choose an icon to explore.
Stage 04 · Dependability
Dependability.
Dependability earns trust. Trust strengthens loyalty.
Dependability is the ability to keep our commitments repeatedly through the way the business works.
A dependable business cannot rely indefinitely on exceptional effort to achieve ordinary results.
Repeated rescue efforts can reveal where the work needs stronger connections, resources or support.
What needs attention so the business can keep its commitments through the way the work is organised and carried out?
Stage 05 · Thriving
Thriving.
Thriving is success the business can sustain.
Thriving grows from consistently serving the customer well. It gives the business the strength and capacity to sustain that value into the future.
That brings the connection back to Customer Value: how well the business serves its customer remains central to what success means.
Return to Customer ValueOperational Drift
When intentions and everyday work drift apart.
Recognising the gap gives the business something it can act on.
Operational Drift is the gap that can develop between what a business intends and how its work actually happens. Small adjustments, workarounds and changing conditions can gradually move the work away from its intended direction.
Alignment makes the gap visible.
Operational Alignment connects the business’s direction and priorities with how work is organised, resourced and carried out. It helps leaders understand where connections need attention and bring the work back together.
Integrity connects intention with practice.
Operational Integrity is the business repeatedly doing what it says it will do, in the way it has agreed to work.
Within OAI, DRIFT — Recognising Patterns of Operational Drift™ focuses attention on those patterns.