Make It Clear Who Decides

Sharing a consistently observed leadership challenge from 2019 as many of us begin drafting our 2020 business goals. Productivity is lost when teams cannot easily identify the ultimate decision maker for their body of work. The matrixed, cross-functional environments we operate within (at small and large companies alike) afford us thought diversity and other beneficial gains, but they also yield multiple stakeholders (often with competing priorities) for one project. Too often, we do a poor job of delineating between a stakeholder and a decision maker when setting up our project teams and writing our goals, and our teams and customers suffer. Innovation slows down, morale drops, talent begins exiting the organization. Stakeholders are people whose opinions and guidance we should seek, but decision makers assume the responsibility to make a final call when consensus is not easily reached. It’s our duty to help our teams understand the difference. Eliminate the churn at the beginning... when you’re writing your annual goals. Make it clear who decides.