The Real Leadership Hack? Stop Being Needed So Much
If your calendar is a war zone and your team’s waiting on you for every move... you don’t have a delegation problem — you have a trust problem.
Marybeth’s inbox was already exploding. Her coffee had gone cold. Again. She rubbed her temples — it was 7:03am and she already wanted to disappear.
Every leader on her team had questions for her, proposals to review, and ideas to run by her. She wondered, “Is this what being a leader is meant to feel like? Are you supposed to be the go-to person for everything?”
When we reviewed these questions together in our weekly session, it became obvious pretty quickly, Marybeth had created a dynamic where her team felt like they had to ask for permission at every step.
“I thought I was being helpful,” she told me. “Turns out I was just clogging the pipes.”
Her vision was a team of people who felt empowered and could move seamlessly through their days.
Instead, she’d built a game of hot potato. And no one wanted to move forward without tossing to her first.
People were spending their precious time and energy worrying about and getting approval for the work rather than investing their talents into doing the work.
Bureaucracy was everywhere. Progress was nowhere.
The worst part? Marybeth was completely underwater. She didn’t have time to think or do any of the things that only she could do as the leader.
Signs that an organization is an ineffective bureaucracy.
It wasn’t obvious to Marybeth that she had built a monster because the signs were subtle and gradual.
It started with a few more meetings a month asking for her to be a thought partner. Then she noticed that she was getting a few more emails every week asking for approval. Before long, she was getting requests daily for additional review and checking the progress of initiatives multiple times throughout each stage.
When she asked about the status of work, the answer was more often “I’m waiting for someone to review the work" than “we’re on track” or “ahead of schedule.”
Soon Marybeth lost control of her calendar as people constantly sought her out, inundating her with meetings. The same was happening for her direct reports.
In meetings, Marybeth began to notice that people would wait for her to share her view before they weighed in, and more often than not, they would agree with her.
The final straw came after one particular meeting where the meeting organizer asked her to approve the meeting notes. That’s when she knew it was time to step back and take a hard look at what was happening.
Organizational culture devolves over time unless leaders intentionally direct the culture.
Organizations are a reflection of the people in it and what they both promote and condone as acceptable behaviors.
Leaders who are insecure, have a high need for control, and don’t have a vision for what is good often create cultures unintentionally because they let their fears drive their behaviors.
They nitpick at unimportant details, convey that perfection is required, and they publicly shame people, furthering a culture of fear and a lack of trust.
The result?
Top talent starts to leave. Top talent like to move forward. They don’t just take orders, they want to accomplish the objective. Top talent wants to move as freely as possible because they thrill in getting things done.
Who get’s left behind?
The people OK with playing in the safe zone: people who anchor to gatekeepers, people who only take reactive action, and people who spend more time ruminating and less time doing.
It’s a vicious cycle. The leader’s behavior causes the ones who could change behaviors for the better to give up and leave. The ones that remain further perpetuate the problematic culture.
The saddest part about leaders who create organizations of ineffective bureaucracy?
They often don’t even know that they are doing it.
It’s easy to say, “Don’t be one of those leaders,” but often, when you are in fear, you aren’t even aware of your behaviors and the consequences.
This is what happened to Marybeth.
She was overwhelmed by a changing market landscape, a demanding Board, and a lack of clarity around how to grow the business. The reality is that the business at the moment was still strong. But she was letting her fear of the future constrain her team and make it much harder to find the best path forward.
It was time to make a shift.
How do you transition to a culture where authority is delegated appropriately and your team feels greater autonomy?
Start by sharing your intention to create maximum autonomy.
Marybeth engaged her direct reports and the first layer of leadership to convey her intentions. This allowed her to explain her thinking and take responsibility for creating a bureaucratic culture. It also allowed her to gather their input and ideas.
The feedback was overwhelmingly positive. Most of her direct reports felt stifled and were disappointed that the organization was moving so slowly.
However, two members of her team expressed concern about letting go of control. They framed it as increasing risk and lack of confidence about their teams. Both leaders had perpetuated the low autonomy model with their teams and led the slowest-moving departments in the company.
A wonderful byproduct of Marybeth’s decision to share her plans early was that she was able to have direct conversations afterwards with these two leaders to determine if they could get on board with the change.
When making a significant culture change, the worst you can do is leave dissent from senior leaders unaddressed. You’ll confuse the broader team and possibly sabotage the entire effort. Luckily Marybeth avoided that issue:
One of the two leaders who was resistant chose to exit the company quickly.
The other leader shared that she wanted to try the model even if she was skeptical. Marybeth was clear, she was welcome to try, but if at any point either of them felt like it wasn’t working, they should meet again and plan a transition.
Inspiring leaders and employees who aren’t aligned with a high autonomy model to leave is a good thing. Your current team has likely self-selected to be part of your stifling bureaucracy.
When you make a change, it’s likely that several of them will want to move on or won’t thrive in the new regime. Allow them to see it coming and make the choice for themselves before you have to make it for them.
Delegate authority clearly and optimize it over time.
When you decide to go down the path of maximum autonomy, your goal should not be to give away all authority.
You aren’t just trying to hand over the reins. You’re getting clear about decision-making authority: who has it, what are they authorized to do, and under what conditions.
The who is generally easier to define. Most organizations leverage their hierarchy to segment who has authority over what. You don’t need uniformity by level or across all departments. What matters is that people understand who has delegated authority over what.
What folks are authorized to do generally aligns with the buckets of responsibilities that leaders have: strategy, goals, budget, people, and policies. There are other nuances, but if you align on those big buckets you will have covered 80% of what matters.
The conditions are where things can get a bit dicey.
Conditions can include market dynamics, financial performance, changes in leadership, and more. When you clarify these conditions, you’re helping your team understand exceptions for when authority might be centralized again so that they understand the why and aren’t blindsided.
Organizations are undergoing rapid change or facing a crisis may want to return to a less autonomous model to optimize for rapid response and coordination. Helping your team understand why helps everyone operate with less friction and greater speed and clarity.
When everyone understands who is authorized and why, you not only improve productivity but you’ll foster greater trust and confidence across the organization.
Take a hard look at your delegation progress every week.
If this is truly a priority, then set aside time to plan and assess your progress every week:
Look ahead at your calendar and at your top initiatives: Have you delegated well? Is there more authority you should be handing off?
Ask yourself how it is going: Did you insert yourself unnecessarily? Are all leaders delegating responsibility?
How many times people came to you: Are people coming to you for appropriate questions or should they be going to someone else or simply moving forward because they are authorized to do so.
Ask your team for their thoughts periodically: Are folks feeling fully authorized? Did your team step up and take decisions that they were authorized to take? Are they feeling unblocked? Are they moving faster?
Over time is your calendar should clear up. Your email should be more under control. People should be coming to you less for the items that they or someone else should be able to handle. You won’t be asked to review something that doesn’t need your input.
If you aren’t seeing these results, it’s time to dig in more deeply with your team to find out where things are clicking.
Most of the time, when things are working, it’s because something isn’t clear to someone in the organization. Take the time to understand what isn’t working and clear it up. Then try again.
If all goes well, get ready for more change.
As this takes hold and members of your team embrace the change, more change will happen. It might even accelerate.
Your team will turnover. Those who don’t need more bureaucracy will feel overwhelmed and start to struggle more publicly or leave. If they aren’t leaving, your leaders should start to exit them. It’s the kind thing to do.
Your team will start moving faster. There will be fewer bottlenecks and people will get more attuned to who is responsible for what.
Your team will no longer need you for every decision. They will be building the muscles to operate more independently and autonomously.
If you were feeling dragged down, get ready… you might feel a sense of freedom (gasp!).
When you have created an organization with maximum autonomy, you will have more free time to do what only you can do:
Consider the strategic context of the business
Focusing on the internal and external relationships that only you can nurture
Review your team’s progress and map out future scenarios
Read more and have the time to process your thoughts
Identify where your team should head next
Take the time to take care of your own needs so that you are better equipped to handle the level of uncertainty and the stresses that come with your leadership role
What I describe above might simultaneously feel like a utopia and like a nightmare. You won’t know until you try.
What I promise is that won’t feel like the organization you currently lead — it’ll challenge you and your entire team to level up your thinking, your doing, and your culture. Only the most talented people can operate with the deepest level of trust can operate well with maximum autonomy.
Those that do, feel a sense of flow, excitement and contentment that is hard to rival in any other mode of operating. Leaders like Marybeth have been able to achieve this level of delegation. You can, too.
Key Takeaways
Achieving maximum autonomy is possible in any organization and will lead to both better operational results, but also a greater sense of freedom for everyone in the organization, including you as it’s leader.
Here are the steps you need to take to get there:
Assess the effects of your current bureaucratic methods. It’s always helpful to take stock of your starting point.
Share your intentions to shift to maximum autonomy with your team and get their inputs, feedback, and address dissent early.
Clarify how you are delegating authority and under what conditions. Who will be authorized to determine what and when.
Assess your progress weekly to start and make adjustments quickly so that you don’t lose momentum.
If all goes well, you’ll experience more change over time and some of it will be jarring or daunting for folks for whom autonomy is not a great fit.
Remember, making change isn’t easy, but if you are committed to the positive outcomes, continue to see it through the bumps and the stumbles. Be kind and respectful to those who want to move on, but don’t try to hold on to people for whom the future path is not a fit.
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A very accurate sum up of how a culture of over-dependence can quietly take hold and how it often stems from good intentions. I’ve seen this as well in corporate environments: leaders trying to be helpful end up becoming bottlenecks and teams get conditioned to seek approval instead of taking ownership (I was also one of these people). I gave upward feedback once to my supervisor saying that the shift to clearer delegation and autonomy required him letting go of control, which, I appreciate, is often the hardest part.
I think when organizations are small or just starting out, it’s easier to stay flexible and move quickly. But as they grow, more policies get added to keep things on track and that’s when the red tape creeps in. The problem is, no one goes back to see if those rules still make sense. And this is probably the beginning of the attitude of well this is how we've always done it comes from.