How can you evolve your company’s technology or business model? Redefine how you govern it.

When a company reaches the point of asking itself "how should we organize ourselves to perform better?", it often faces a huge challenge: there is no universal manual for redesigning organizations. Every company is different, with its own context, culture, and objectives.

After years of supporting our clients through this process, at Paradigma we know that a well-designed and implemented governance framework makes a real difference in helping an organization operate efficiently and effectively.

Frameworks vs. Company Reality

There are many recognized frameworks and methodologies in the market: SAFe, LeSS, Kanban Maturity Model, Team Topologies, Nexus… all of them offer best practices and proven standards. However, none of them alone explain how to fit into your company’s structure, processes, or culture.

That’s where many companies stumble. Trying to apply a framework by the book without adapting it often creates more friction than value. At Paradigma, we’re clear: our role is to take the best from these standards and combine them with the client's reality to create a unique, actionable model.

We’ve seen it time and again: companies implementing a textbook framework without adaptations or a clear implementation plan quickly discover their funding models, decision-making structures, or even work methods conflict with it. The result is usually frustration, resistance to change, and sometimes even regression.

Experience in Different Scenarios

We have designed and implemented governance models in all kinds of organizations: from traditional companies needing to modernize project management to digital platforms looking to scale without losing agility, including highly regulated environments where compliance was as critical as innovation.

In some cases, the challenge was gaining efficiency and scalability; in others, optimizing demand and portfolio management; and in many, simply ensuring the organization delivers value more predictably and sustainably.

From this experience, we've gained one certainty: no two governance models are the same. And that’s exactly the difference between applying a generic framework and designing a tailored one.

What our clients value most is that we don’t improvise. At Paradigma, we follow a clear process with well-defined phases that allow us to move from strategic reflection to practical implementation with consistency:

1. Strategic alignment: we understand the company’s objectives and what is expected from the new model. Governance must be a means, not an end.
2. Current model analysis: we map processes, roles, metrics, and pain points to get a realistic picture of the starting point.
3. Selection of applicable standards: we look for practices and solutions from the market or our own experience that fit logically and help solve problems and move toward the goals.
4. Target model definition: we design a practical and realistic governance model tailored to the company’s specific moment, fully aligned with its culture, context, and current situation.
5. Incremental implementation: we execute a deployment plan that turns the design into reality through incremental delivery, measuring results, and adjusting continuously.
6. Continuous improvement: because a governance model is never “finished,” it constantly evolves, and it's important to have mechanisms in place to ensure inspection and adaptation.

Throughout this journey, we don’t leave teams on their own. We bring together experts in transformation, architecture, and change management, ensuring the model is not just designed but also adaptable, implementable, and scalable.

Key Learnings from These Processes

We’ve often found organizations operating with different management models across departments. Each one seemed solid on its own, but together they created duplications, conflicting priorities, and unnecessarily complex processes. In other cases, teams described their situation as “running around like headless chickens”: many ongoing projects but little direction.

Over the years, we’ve learned the best way to detect whether a company needs a new governance model is to spot certain recurring signals. Here are some of the most common:

• Projects pile up without a clear prioritization criterion.
• Too many different management models coexist within the same company.
• There’s a perceived lack of coordination between key areas or teams.
• The time-to-market is too long, and no one knows exactly why.
• The tech architecture doesn’t scale as fast as the business does.
• Follow-up meetings generate more questions than answers.

If any of these sound familiar, it’s probably time to design a tailored governance model that brings back direction, clarity, and structure. And in that journey, accumulated experience is key. These are lessons we always share within our Governance Community at Paradigma:

• Don’t start with frameworks: always begin with strategic objectives. The framework is a means, not an end.
• Involve the right people from the start: it's not just about leadership or tech teams. All key stakeholders must be aligned to avoid future resistance.
• Clearly define the initial parts to implement: choosing pilot projects that are too large or complex artifacts can sink the whole initiative. Better to aim for small visible wins that build trust and show quick value.
• Always consider the financial model: governance and financial models must go hand in hand. If they're not aligned, one will block the other. A prioritization system must match the governance approach.
• Use value-based metrics: beyond deadlines or satisfaction scores, we need clear evidence that the framework helps meet business goals — metrics on actual value, unrealized value, outcomes, and flow. This helps manage change and gives meaning to every step.
• Communication and training are key levers: we’ve seen brilliant models fail because people didn’t understand the change or didn’t feel supported.
• Ensure a tech-aligned approach from the start: a governance model can’t be designed in isolation from the company’s tech reality. Architecture, platforms, and tools are where the model is executed — if they’re not ready, governance becomes theory. Integrating tech vision from day one ensures viability and long-term scalability.
• Integrate governance and operations from the beginning: both must be connected and move in harmony. If they drift apart, misalignments will slow down progress.

Why Not Build It Independently?

The temptation to create a “custom-made” framework is strong, but the risks of doing it wrong are even stronger: duplications, lack of coordination, models that never move beyond paper…

Our experience shows success depends on two key factors:

• Proven methodologies
• Expert guidance

At Paradigma, we take both very seriously. Because designing a custom governance model isn’t just an organizational decision — it’s about making sure your company has the right operating system to grow, transform, and compete in an increasingly demanding environment.