Marketing generated the leads.

Sales completed the activities.

Customer success protected retention.

Product increased usage.

Finance protected margin.

Every team hit a metric, but the company still missed its growth goal.

That can happen when teams share a destination but operate with different priorities.

It reminds me of walking Dusty and Tanner.

Dusty sees a squirrel. Tanner finds something interesting to smell. I am trying to get home.

Technically, we are all on the same walk. Operationally, we are pulling in three different directions.

Businesses do the same thing when every function optimizes its own dashboard without connecting its work to one shared business outcome.

That is why the Reframe stage of my Growth Framework includes choosing a North Star metric.

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The North Star is not website traffic, impressions, MQLs, or the number of campaigns launched. It should represent an important growth outcome that multiple teams can influence.

Depending on the company’s real constraint, that might be:

🐕 Qualified pipeline in the priority market

🐕 Pipeline velocity

🐕 Expansion ARR

🐕 Time from qualified opportunity to revenue

The North Star does not replace every other KPI. It creates a hierarchy underneath one primary outcome so marketing, sales, customer success, product, RevOps, and finance can see how their work fits together.

In the latest episode of Walking the Dogs, I explain how to choose the metric, connect supporting KPIs to it, and expose the initiatives that no longer support the company’s growth strategy.

One destination. One primary outcome. One leash keeping the entire pack moving in the same direction.

What metric is your company actually walking toward?

Check it out and get additional resources at Your Teams Can Hit Every KPI and Still Miss the Growth Goal - Lisa Schwartz