Which one sounds like your week?
Different companies.
Suspiciously familiar conversations.
Pick the sentence you have heard before.
“Just check with me first.”
Then the person you need is in meetings until Thursday.
A routine decision passes through three people who can comment, but nobody who will commit. We look at who can actually decide, when approval is needed and what happens when someone gets it wrong.
“I’ll just do it myself.”
The manager’s quickest solution becomes everyone’s permanent arrangement.
The work gets done, so the dependence stays invisible. We follow what managers keep chasing, correcting or taking back—and what their teams would need to finish it without them.
“Our part is done.”
The customer would be delighted. If anyone had finished the rest.
Each team meets its own deadline. Work still stalls at the handover. We examine what gets passed on, what arrives too late and who owns the result across teams.
“It worked when we were smaller.”
So did asking the founder about absolutely everything.
More people now depend on decisions and arrangements made for a much smaller company. We look at which roles, approvals and handovers have outgrown those arrangements.
“Ask Anna. She knows.”
Anna is on holiday. Apparently, so is the answer.
The instructions are in someone’s head; the exceptions are in their inbox. We find the work that depends on personal memory and what others need to handle it confidently.
“We need another person.”
Possibly. But what will they spend their day working around?
Extra capacity can help. It can also add another person to the same approval queue. We examine workload alongside rework, waiting and unclear responsibilities before treating headcount as the answer.
Explore Beyond Headcount →
When every route leads to one person
Five people copied in.
Still no decision.
One asks for more context. Another adds a name to the thread. Someone suggests a quick call.
By Friday, the email has travelled further than the work.
We trace one real decision: who was involved, where it waited and who could have moved it forward. That gives us something specific to change.
Before trying the same fix again
The third reminder
is probably not the solution.
If people need chasing every week, look at what happens between agreeing and delivering. Can they decide? Do they have what they need? What else takes priority?
Start with the Diagnostic →What keeps coming back
onto your agenda?
Bring us a recent example. The email, the handover, the decision that went nowhere. We can start there.