Outcome Enablement Assessment
Leading for activity or impact?
This tool identifies where the gap between intention and impact is largest in your organisation. It is not a test with right or wrong answers.
Score each statement honestly — 1 means this is not how we work, 5 means this is exactly how we work. If completing with a colleague, note where your scores differ. Those gaps are usually more informative than the scores themselves.
Section 1
The Activity Trap
Does your organisation confuse effort with impact?
Question 1
We can clearly articulate the specific condition we are trying to change this year — not in strategic themes or directional language, but in precise, observable, real-world terms.
Not us
Exactly us
Question 2
When a new initiative is proposed, the first question we ask is: what must be observably different in the real world if this works — and for whom? Not: what will we deliver?
Not us
Exactly us
Question 3
Our leadership team spends more time discussing whether we are changing the right condition than whether we are completing the right activities.
Not us
Exactly us
Section 2
Vague Success
Is your definition of success precise enough to organise action around?
Question 4
Our primary outcome — the most important condition we exist to change right now — is documented in a clear statement that every senior leader would describe in the same real-world terms.
Not us
Exactly us
Question 5
We have examined the assumptions underneath our significant programmes and investments — not just whether they are being delivered, but whether they can plausibly create the difference they were commissioned to create.
Not us
Exactly us
Question 6
When we evaluate success, we look for evidence of real-world change in the condition we defined — not delivery of outputs, completion of milestones, or positive stakeholder sentiment alone.
Not us
Exactly us
Section 3
Misaligned Effort
Are teams pointing in the same direction — independently?
Question 7
Our teams and functions can each articulate how their specific work contributes to the primary condition — and could make decisions in service of that condition without needing to escalate for approval.
Not us
Exactly us
Question 8
When a decision about how to pursue the condition needs to be made, it is made by the people closest to the work — not routinely held for senior leadership sign-off.
Not us
Exactly us
Question 9
When we observe effort that is not contributing to our primary condition, we have a clear, practised way of redirecting or stopping it — and leaders are willing to use it even when it is uncomfortable.
Not us
Exactly us
Section 4
Governance Expansion
Does your governance serve the outcome — or substitute for it?
Question 10
Our governance and reporting structures are designed to surface whether the condition is changing — not just whether activities are being delivered on time and on budget.
Not us
Exactly us
Question 11
We could remove one third of our regular governance meetings without losing our ability to know whether we are moving the condition. The meetings that remain exist to steer, not reassure.
Not us
Exactly us
Section 5
Undefined Outcomes & Stewardship
Has your organisation closed the upstream gap — and named the person who protects it?
Question 12
Before any significant programme or initiative begins, we invest meaningful time defining the precise condition we are trying to change — not the activities we will deliver, and not the outputs we will produce.
Not us
Exactly us
Question 13
There is a named senior leader — not a committee, not a workstream — who is personally responsible for protecting the precision of the primary condition throughout the life of the work.
Not us
Exactly us
Question 14
Our leadership team is genuinely prepared to lead differently in an outcome-focused organisation: to trust the people closest to the work, to define the destination rather than direct the path, and to measure success by whether the condition moves.
Not us
Exactly us
Question 15
We clearly separate outcomes-focused work from statutory, regulatory, and compliance obligations. Both are reported honestly for what they are. Neither is used as evidence of the other.
Not us
Exactly us
Please answer all 15 questions before viewing your results.
All 15 questions must be answered. Your responses are not stored.
—
out of 75
The score is a starting point, not a verdict. What matters more than the total is the pattern. A low score on Section 5 almost always explains low scores everywhere else — undefined outcomes produce the activity trap, the vague success, the misalignment, and the governance expansion that the other sections describe. The upstream work is always the beginning.
Where to start the conversation
Your responses have not been stored or saved anywhere. This assessment is completely anonymous. The results you see exist only in this session — they will not be retained when you close the page.
A conversation worth having
This assessment is designed to surface the conversation, not replace it. If your scores have raised questions about where your organisation is directing its energy — or whether the leadership behaviours in place are enabling the work or constraining it — that is a conversation worth having.