The true cost of poor team alignment (and how to fix it)

Employee alignment with organizational goals is declining at an alarming rate. In 2024, 44% of leaders believed their employees were entirely aligned with organizational goals, but only 14% of employees agreed. Axios HQ’s 2025 report on the State of Internal Communications shows the numbers dropped by nearly half.

• Just 27% of leaders believe their teams are aligned with organizational goals. A meager 9% of employees agree.  

• Leaders have to be able to align employees with the organization's “big picture” because poor employee alignment results in reduced employee engagement. Low engagement leads to poor productivity, and poor productivity prevents business success.

Leaders should go on a listening tour, collect employee feedback, and audit their processes to determine where they’re dropping the ball before poor employee alignment gets expensive. 

The high cost of poor team alignment 

Organizations with high employee alignment also have better employee performance and engagement, resulting in fewer negative outcomes. According to Gallup’s 2024 report on the state of the global workplace, organizations with engaged teams see a...

• 78% decrease in employee absenteeism.
• 21% decrease in employee turnover for high-turnover organizations.
• 51% decrease in employee turnover for low-turnover organizations.
• 31% decrease in quality defects.

Higher employee engagement also produces positive outcomes...

• 23% increase in profitability.
• 70% increase in employee wellbeing.
• 18% increase in productivity.
• 10% increase in customer loyalty and engagement.

Team alignment and engagement start with a strong communication strategy. While 73% of leaders think their teams have an easy way of finding the goals, strategies, and directives shared by execs, only 49% of employees agree. Close gaps that grow from internal communication breakdowns.

How to promote team alignment

Here are five things successful organizations do differently to strengthen employee alignment and engagement...

1. Clarify business objectives

Over 70% of employees say how well they understand company goals affects how engaged they are at work. Up to 85% of company leaders also report that how well their teams understand the company goals has impacted business performance.

That means a lack of clear communication about business objectives and priorities is to blame for the growing misalignment we see in the workplace. 

• Leaders have to not only set clear company goals and objectives but communicate them effectively across the organization.
• Next, managers need to understand and connect them to individual team goals and objectives. 

The result: Every team member has a clear understanding of how their work contributes to the overall company goals, giving them a sense of purpose that's critical to a thriving workforce.

We asked employees what areas of their work were impacted when they clearly understood business objectives and were engaged at work... 

• 63% said productivity. 
• 59% said motivation.
• 54% said satisfaction.
• 45% said the ability to collaborate well.
• 44% said the ability to problem solve.
• 37% said creative thinking.
• 35% said the ability to stick to project timelines.
• 28% said analytical thinking.
• 15% said bandwidth.

Plus, ~40% of employees would be more likely to go above and beyond if they were better informed about the role they play in bringing key initiatives to life. Clarify business objectives. Make sure each employee understands their part in achieving them.

2. Create a clear communication strategy

Effective communication creates stronger employee alignment, but only 50% of employees agree with the 80% of leaders who think their internal communications are clear and engaging.

• That same percentage of leaders think their comms are helpful, relevant, and include the context employees need to do their job. Once again, just 53% of employees agree.

Alignment suffers from poor, ineffective communication. Your managers are the ones cascading business strategy down the line, so train them to be effective and engaging communicators. 

Remember: Slack co-founder Steward Butterfield says "One confusing message from a manager to a group of 20 people can set people spinning for a really, really long time. The simplest piece of advice is to aim for old-fashioned newspaper writing — short sentences [and] tight paragraphs centered on the readers degree of context."

• "That can be trained. [It's] worth investing in, even if it's an hour-long class once for every employee. We made it part of the onboarding process.” 

Top execs and employees also need to be trained how to communicate effectively and need access to supporting tools and resources.  

• 67% of employees report they prefer to receive critical updates through email and regular newsletters — send one from your CEO to promote employee engagement. 
• Take our internal communications maturity quiz to evaluate your comms strategy and identify gaps that could be employee engagement opportunities.

3. Align employee incentives with organizational goals

Employees want to be recognized by managers and leaders for their extra effort, but only one out of three employees in the U.S said they received it, according to Gallup.

The opportunity: Recognize employees for their work alongside strategic incentives that tie back to organization goals to align them with where you're headed while showing the rest of the team what success — and the ideal culture — looks like.

• Beyond team alignment, this kind of recognition elevates employee morale and motivation, demonstrating leaders actually see and value employee contributions. 

⚙️ How it works: Reevaluate your company incentives to make sure they align with your organizational goals. Consider what happens if you don't. Take a business objective like improving customer experiences...

• If you incentivize the customer support team based solely on the number of support tickets closed per day, you might inadvertently encourage them to rush through the inquiries just to hit their quota, leading to more repeat inquiries and frustrated customers. 

4. Conduct regular check-ins

Business objectives shift all the time, and so do employee preferences. Ongoing conversations between managers and employees offer a reliable feedback loop where employees have complete visibility into strategic business priorities as they change.

• These one-on-ones also give managers and execs a constant pulse check on employee sentiment, opinions and feedback. 

We asked employees to rate the top ways their leaders can improve in 2024. An opportunity to provide feedback came in second at 36%, just behind the desire for a more consistent cadence (37%). 

Yes, but: Leaders vastly overestimate feedback accessibility. 72% of leaders, for example, think employees have an easy way of sharing feedback regarding the quality of the communications they receive. Only 46% of employees agreed. 

Set up a feedback collection system that allows employees to communicate with management to share their feedback and opinions beyond one-on-ones.

The big picture: Collecting feedback is only half the battle — leaders have to be intentional about addressing employee feedback. It's the only way to make sure they know their voices matter. 

5. Invest in communication and collaboration tools

68% of the organizations that increased their investment in communication were a lot more likely to see increased employee alignment with business goals, compared to just 32% of organizations that either maintained or reduced their investments.

The benefits don’t stop at better alignment. Businesses that invest in effective communication and collaboration practices are also more likely to see:

• New business revenue
• Net-dollar retention
• Innovation and competitive advantage
• Increased employee satisfaction (eNPS)
• Employee retention
• Customer retention
• Reputation in the market 

Employee feedback can inform the right tools and practices to invest in. 67% of employees want critical updates through newsletters or email, 39% prefer in-person meetings, and 24% want virtual staff or department meetings. 

Also consider your organizational needs, company size, and onsite vs remote employee distribution. Then, pick effective communication channels that will help you engage employees and maintain alignment with business goals. 

🌟 For example: Cox Communications improved staff’s understanding of business goals by 17 percentage points with the help of Axios HQ’s Smart Brevity Principles. The company's SVP of Corporate Communications explains...

• “We went from less than 70% of our workforce understanding our goals all the way to 87% of them saying they do. A huge jump. And the only thing we did different was use the Smart Brevity principles.” 

The bottom line

Organizational alignment starts with effective internal communications at the very top. Business leaders have to invest in comms and the managers who connect the dots between strategic business goals and team objectives. They also have to establish clear communication lines for employee feedback and opinions.

Go deeper: 8 internal communication best practices to follow in 2025