We want people who take ownership. We want teams that solve problems before they reach our desk. We want a culture where people aren't just waiting to be told what to do.
But here’s the deal: You can’t mandate empowerment. You can’t just hang a poster that says “Take Ownership” and expect your team to suddenly start acting like CEOs.
Why? Because often, the biggest barrier to their empowerment isn’t their lack of motivation. It’s the way we, as leaders, are making decisions.
We think we’re leading. We think we’re being decisive. But without realizing it, we’re often making decisions in a vacuum—what we call an inward mindset—that actually make it impossible for our people to succeed.
Let me tell you a story about a leader who learned this the hard way.
The "Closed Door" Trap
This leader was a principal at a high school. A smart, capable guy. He identified a clear problem: transfer students were falling through the cracks.
Students would enroll in the middle of the year, get lost in the shuffle, and struggle to acclimate. He wanted to fix it. He wanted these kids to hit the ground running.
So, he went into his office, closed the door, and came up with a plan.
His solution was simple and decisive: A mandatory full-day orientation. If a new student didn't complete the orientation, they would be sent back to their previous school until they did.
On paper? It looked like a strong leadership move. It set a standard. It prioritized student success.
But here is what was really going on.
Because he made that decision behind a closed door—focused entirely on his objective and his vision—he was blind to the reality of the people who had to execute it.
When "Good" Decisions Create Chaos
Inevitably, some students skipped the orientation. The policy kicked in, and they were transferred back.
What the principal didn't see—because he wasn't looking—was the chaos this created for his school secretary.
You see, un-enrolling and re-enrolling a student isn't just a button click. It’s a mountain of paperwork. It involves coordination with the other school, updating district records, and managing confused parents.
By mandating this policy without consulting the people doing the work, he had inadvertently doubled her workload. He turned her job into a nightmare of administrative churn.
If she had stayed silent, she would have just resented him. She would have seen him as the villain making her life miserable. And he would have seen her as "resistant to change" or "complaining."
That is the collusion of the workplace. He pushes; she resists. Nobody wins.
The Turn: Inviting the Hard Truth
But this story has a different ending because this school had been doing the work. They had been training in outward mindset.
Because they had a shared language, the secretary didn't just stew in frustration. She felt safe enough to knock on his door.
She didn't come in attacking. She didn't say, "You're killing me with this."
She came in with an outward mindset. She said, essentially: "I know you want these students to succeed. I do too. But I need to show you how this decision is impacting our ability to get that done."
She laid out the reality of the paperwork. She showed him the cost of the churn.
And because the principal was willing to lower his defenses and actually listen—to see her needs and challenges as real as his own—the solution became obvious in about five minutes.
The Fix: Don't process the official transfer paperwork until after the orientation is complete.
Simple. Effective. It saved hours of work, reduced friction, and still achieved the goal of student orientation.
How to Actually Empower Your Team
That is what real empowerment looks like. It’s not about giving pep talks. It’s about creating a culture where the person with the least authority feels safe enough to tell the person with the most authority, "Hey, there is a better way."
If you want to see those kinds of results in your organization, you have to start with yourself.
Here is a quick 3-step check you can run before you roll out your next "great idea":
See the People, Not Just the Problem: Before you lock in a decision, ask yourself: Who is going to have to execute this?
Get Curious Before You Get Decisive: Go to those people. Ask them, "If we did X, how would that impact your work? What am I missing?"
Invite the "No": Make it safe for them to tell you why your idea might suck. If they know you care about their success, they’ll help you make the idea bulletproof.
When you shift your mindset from inward (my goals, my ideas) to outward (our collective success), you don't just get compliance. You get brilliance.
And that is how you improve organizational results.
FAQ: Empowerment & Mindset
Q: How do I get employees to speak up if they’ve been quiet for years?
A: You have to go first. You can't just announce an "open door policy." You have to actively demonstrate that you value their perspective. Go to them and say, "I’ve been making decisions in a silo, and I suspect I’ve made your job harder. Can you tell me one thing I’ve done recently that got in your way?" Then—and this is critical—do not defend yourself. Just listen and say thank you.
Q: Isn't this just "management by committee"? I need to be decisive.
A: No. You are still the leader. You still make the call. But an outward mindset ensures your call is informed by reality. The principal in the story still required orientation; he just adjusted the how based on the needs of his team. That’s not weakness; that’s intelligence.
Q: What if my team just complains instead of offering solutions?
A: Often, complaints are just solutions wrapped in frustration. If someone is complaining, it means they care enough to be upset. Help them translate that frustration. Ask, "I hear that this is frustrating. If you were in my shoes, how would you solve this problem while still meeting our objective?" Turn them from critics into partners.
Q: We’re a large organization (1,000+ employees). Can this scale?
A: Absolutely. In fact, it’s more critical at scale. In large orgs, the distance between the decision-maker and the execution is huge. You can't talk to everyone, but you can equip your mid-level managers to have these conversations. When you train your leaders to operate with an outward mindset, you create a network of accountability that scales faster than any policy you could write.
