Alignment consulting, powered by human insight.
Humans are the most complex system in any organization — and it's not always common sense to see how human dynamics drive whether a business achieves its mission. HumanSense was built to provide a pulse around human alignment dynamics: understanding how each person is driven, making it easier for people to relate to one another, building more cohesive, accelerated teams, and exposing what's happening beneath the surface when organizational strategy isn't executing. Built on three decades of reading every type of room — from theater stages, to the bar, to the shop floor, to the boardroom — backed by real behavioral science, not guesswork.
Organization
- Unclear Vision
- Misaligned Priorities
- Conflicting Incentives
- Mission Creep
- Change Resistance
- Leadership Gaps
Team
- Role Confusion
- Siloed Thinking
- Poor Communication
- Weak Accountability
- Competing Agendas
- Information Hoarding
Relationships
- Low Trust
- Conflict
- Boundaries
- Repair
- Psychological Risk
- Cultural Friction
Individual
- Differences
- Decision Paralysis
- Lack of Ownership
- Burnout
- Skill Gaps
- Lack of Feedback
Why "HumanSense"
"My why is simple: healthier work dynamics create a better world. When organizations work well, people feel better, families function better, communities stabilize, economies grow, mental health improves, and gaps between generations, cultures, and worldviews get smaller."
— ALY MCKINSTER, FOUNDER
About
The person behind HumanSense
Aly has spent her life learning how people work, what motivates them, and what inspires them. Long before she advised executives and leadership teams, she was reading audiences from a stage, navigating packed dining rooms, and building relationships with people from all walks of life. Today, that same instinct helps her quickly understand the human dynamics beneath the surface — what people are saying, what they're not saying, and what's preventing real alignment.
Throughout her career, Aly has worked with organizations of every size and growth stage, from small startups and community nonprofits to manufacturers, national associations, social impact organizations, Fortune 500 companies, and one of the world's leading consulting firms. She has partnered with frontline staff, volunteers, founders, sales teams, emerging leaders, executives, boards, and C-suite leadership — earning a reputation for connecting with people regardless of title, industry, or background.
Most recently, she served as a Senior Manager of Organizational Performance, helping leaders navigate culture transformation, workforce strategy, team effectiveness, and organizational change. She also reimagined employee resource group strategy, built the firm's first profitable Business Resource Group from the ground up, and established a national speaking platform focused on leadership and organizational performance.
What makes Aly different is the combination of lived experience, intuition, and methodology. Her approach was built on stages, behind a bar, in boardrooms, and through hundreds of conversations with individuals and teams — then sharpened through behavioral science, organizational development, and leadership consulting.
She helps leaders see what others miss, align teams around what matters most, and build organizations where people and performance thrive together.
Throughline: when people are aligned, business becomes a lot more simple.
Services
Most business problems aren’t strategy problems — they’re alignment problems. Fix that, and the rest follows.
Because common sense with humans isn't always common… especially these days
01
Organizational Strategy and Culture Assessment
Before anything gets fixed, it has to be diagnosed correctly. Using validated assessment tools and two decades of pattern-recognition across manufacturing, nonprofit, government, and enterprise clients, I help leadership see what's actually driving performance — then turn that read into an operating model and a set of priorities people can execute against.
- Culture & organizational assessments (Human Synergistics OCI/OEI, Predictive Index)
- Operating model design — governance, decision rights, and cross-functional handoffs
- Post-merger & reorg integration — unifying separate teams into one structure
- Priority-setting: what to fix first, and what to leave alone
- Marketing & growth strategy
- Startup launch strategy — business-in-a-box: what you're offering, who you're trying to reach, how you'll reach them, and website creation
- Customer success strategy
02
Board & Leadership Team Development
Boards and executive teams don't get aligned by accident. It takes a facilitator who can hold the room, name what's actually going on, and drive the group toward real decisions instead of another meeting that ends in "let's circle back." I design and lead the sessions that get senior teams unstuck.
- Leadership retreats & offsites
- Mission, vision & values work
- Post-acquisition leadership team integration
- Team alignment & cohesion workshops
- Generational divide workshops
- Workstyle discovery
- Aligning strengths to strategy
- Consensus-building & group process facilitation (Technology of Participation)
- AI for Good
- Radical team building
03
Relationship & Conflict Repair
Most tension in a workplace isn't a strategy problem — it's a relationship one. I facilitate the conversations people have been avoiding: between co-founders, between departments, between a leader and a team that's stopped trusting them — using structured conflict-resolution and consensus-building methods to get to something real, not just a truce.
- One-on-one and team conflict resolution
- Facilitated hard conversations
- Cross-functional relationship repair
- Consensus-building & group process facilitation (Technology of Participation)
- Communication coaching
- Sales development
04
Individual Development & Coaching
Coaching grounded in behavioral science, not generic advice. Using Predictive Index behavioral assessments, I help people understand how they're wired, where they get in their own way, and what to do about it — whether that's stepping into a bigger role, recovering from burnout, or being taken more seriously in the room.
- Behavioral assessment-based coaching (Predictive Index)
- Personal branding & executive presence
- Networking & confidence coaching
- Burnout recovery coaching
- Succession planning & career transitions
- Shadow side coaching
- Hiring for right fit with behavioral science
- Understanding your why
05
Public Speaking & Keynote
Talks and workshops built around the topics leaders actually ask about — drawn from real client rooms, not theory. Delivered at conferences, executive sessions, and national association events.
Get in touch
Let's talk about what's really going on.
Based in Chicago, working with boards, leadership teams, and individuals wherever they are. Tell me a bit about what's going on and I'll follow up personally.