Hi Reader,
We recently worked with an Executive Team that was doing a lot of things right when it came to setting strategic priorities. They had identified the handful of most important things to accomplish in the upcoming quarter, defined what success would look like, and assigned ownership to individual members of the team. They had even established a regular rhythm to monitor progress and hold one another accountable.
In many ways, they were doing exactly what we encourage executive teams to do.
But when they got to the point where they needed to launch one of their initiatives, everything stalled. The CEO wanted to have more conversations. There were concerns that they hadn't gotten everything quite right, and beneath those concerns was a fear that a handful of people might disagree with some of the decisions. Rather than moving forward, the team continued revisiting the work, leaving those who had invested significant time and energy leading the initiative waiting.
This experience reminded me of an important distinction we've noticed among the Executive Teams we work with. There's a big difference between delegating tasks and delegating ownership.
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Delegating Tasks vs. Delegating Ownership
When we delegate tasks, we're asking someone to do the work. We might ask them to develop a plan, engage stakeholders, gather feedback, and bring recommendations back to the team. But ultimately, the authority to make meaningful decisions still rests with the CEO.
When we delegate ownership, something different happens. We're entrusting someone with an outcome, not simply a set of activities. We're giving them the clarity, authority, and support to make decisions and move important work forward.
That doesn't mean they operate independently. On high-performing Executive Teams, leaders draw on one another's expertise to shape important strategic initiatives. They seek input, welcome different perspectives, and work through challenges together.
But there's a critical difference. They're seeking input to make better decisions, not permission to make every decision.
That distinction can have an enormous impact on how much meaningful work an Executive Team can accomplish together.
The Hidden Cost of Delegating Tasks
Think about what happens when a CEO assigns an important strategic initiative to another member of the Executive Team but continues to serve as the ultimate decision-maker.
The executive leading the initiative invests significant time and energy. They engage colleagues, gather feedback, work through difficult decisions, and develop something they believe will make a difference. Then, just as they're ready to move forward, the work gets put on hold because the CEO wants another conversation or a few people are uncomfortable with the proposed direction.
The result can be incredibly demotivating. What message does it send when someone has done everything asked of them but still isn't trusted to move the work forward?
Over time, leaders adjust their behavior. They become less willing to take initiative, learn to wait for approval rather than exercise judgment, and become increasingly dependent on the CEO. The CEO may feel like they've delegated significant work, but they've retained much of the responsibility for moving it forward.
The result is a bottleneck that limits the capacity of the entire Executive Team. You can delegate a tremendous amount of work without actually increasing the leadership capacity of your team.
Contributor Safety Makes Shared Ownership Possible
In last week's newsletter, we explored Timothy R. Clark's four stages of psychological safety, including Contributor Safety. This third stage is about people feeling trusted and empowered to use their abilities, exercise judgment, and make meaningful contributions.
The distinction between delegating tasks and delegating ownership is a great illustration of what that looks like in practice.
Imagine an Executive Team that has identified four important strategic priorities for the upcoming quarter. Rather than the CEO driving all four, individual members take meaningful ownership of each initiative.
They have clarity about the desired outcomes and the boundaries within which they can make decisions. They engage colleagues when they need input, draw on one another's expertise, and keep the team informed. But they don't need to bring every consequential decision back to the CEO.
This requires trust, not only between the CEO and each executive, but among the entire team. When someone is given ownership, their colleagues need to recognize and support it, even when they might have approached the work differently.
The result is a team where leadership is genuinely shared. Instead of relying on one person to drive the organization's most important work, you have an entire Executive Team capable of moving meaningful strategic priorities forward together.
That's a significant increase in organizational capacity, and one reason investing in the health of an Executive Team can have such a profound impact on performance.
Scheduled Retros Make It Easier to Let Go
There's another important dimension to the story I shared at the beginning. Part of what held the team back was the concern that they hadn't gotten everything quite right.
I understand that instinct. Leaders want to make good decisions, especially when those decisions affect other people. But high-performing Executive Teams don't treat every launch as though it's a permanent decision.
They've developed a commitment to learning and improving together. They establish a direction, make thoughtful decisions, move forward, gather feedback, and adjust as they learn.
This is one reason we're such strong advocates for establishing a regular rhythm of retrospectives. A retrospective creates intentional space to reflect on what worked, what didn't, what we're learning, and what we want to do differently.
Something important happens when this becomes a normal part of how a team operates. Leaders become more willing to empower others because they know they don't have to get everything right the first time.
Rather than delaying an initiative until every possible concern has been addressed, the team can make a thoughtful decision, put something into practice, and learn from the experience through discussion at a team retrospective. Of course, some decisions are difficult to reverse and deserve more consideration. But many initiatives can be refined after they're put into motion.
When learning and improvement are built into the team's operating rhythm, there's less pressure to get everything perfect before moving forward. That creates more freedom for leaders to exercise judgment and take initiative.
A Final Thought
When I think back to the Executive Team I described at the beginning, what stands out isn't that they needed a better strategic planning process. They had a pretty good one.
What they needed was the willingness to trust the leaders they had empowered to carry the work forward. They needed to recognize that a few people disagreeing doesn't necessarily mean a decision is wrong, and that if something doesn't work as intended, they can learn and adjust.
That's what distinguishes Executive Teams that simply divide up the work from those that genuinely lead together.
Think about the most important strategic initiatives your Executive Team is working on right now. Are you delegating tasks, or are you delegating ownership?
Because the real measure of empowerment isn't how much work you've handed off. It's how much meaningful work your team can move forward without everything coming back to you.
-Shaun & Joe
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