Aug 17 2012
Decisions about Making Decisions |IndustryWeek
See on Scoop.it – lean manufacturing
Good points. On the issue of delegation, I apply the “sleep-at-night” test. You can delegate the authority to make a decision, but not the responsibility. Can you sleep at night knowing that you will be accountable for a decision that you let another person make? If you can’t, stay in the loop. Once you trust the person, get out of the way.
See on www.industryweek.com
August 17, 2012 @ 9:08 am
Michel,
I disagree with you on delegating responsibility for a decision. I think it’s incumbent to delegate BOTH authority (what Jamie calls “decision rights”) as well as responsibility. When people don’t have responsibility, they don’t have skin in the game, and they don’t do the necessary homework to ensure that they’re making a prudent choice.
August 17, 2012 @ 9:52 am
You don’t have the right to delegate responsibility. Regardless of how you manage to get a decision made, the buck stops with you. If you are the CEO of BP, you cannot dodge responsibility for the Deepwater Horizon spill, regardless of who you allowed to make the decisions. If you are CEO of Société Générale, you are responsible when a trader like Jérôme Kerviel loses €4B of your depositors’ money. The subordinate who makes wrong decisions has skin in the game, but so do you, which is why you need the sleep-at-night test.