LEADERSHIP AND RESPONSIBILITY
Responsibility grows larger, not closer.
From your own judgement through people and teams to systems and organisations: the wider the radius, the less direct access can stand in for leadership.
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WHERE IT COMES FROM
Lived and learned
01EXPERIENCE
Two worlds
Twelve years in a company with one owner, four years in a regulated corporation. The rules below were formed there, not at a desk.
02TRAINING
Systemic
Systemic coaching and further training. I did not only practise leadership, I had it explained to me.
21 rules · five levels and one pillar · as of September 2026
Leadership responsibility means I carry the consequences of a decision even when others carried it out. Tasks I can delegate, budget too, decision rights as well. What stays is the responsibility, and that hangs on a person, not on a role. So I decide nothing I cannot explain myself, and I stay close enough to the code to know what I am signing. Lose that closeness and you lead by slide deck.
The staircase orders the rules by the reach of responsibility. With each level, what I answer for grows, and what I can reach directly shrinks. Pick a level to filter the rules.
The levels are not ranks. They say how far a responsibility reaches.
INTERFACES
The dashed stretch is the part without authority: expertise, product, technology, people, resources, organisation. Responsibility rarely ends where your own authority to instruct ends.
That is where Digital & IT Business Partnership begins.
ALL LEVELS
Fifteen of the 21 rules sit on five levels — pick a level on the left to filter.
To know what is inside the decision — not to build along. Every week I read one change from the core of the platform, without approving it, without commenting. In the group this was the only source that had not passed through three rounds of slides.
- SITUATION
- A target architecture for the core platform is up for approval; the integrator wrote the text.
- TRAP
- Reading the summary and mistaking that for closeness.
- SIGN
- In the steering committee I ask a question the integrator has no slide for.
When someone wants a decision, I ask by when they need it and name the point in time. Until then I check three things: people, money, dependencies on running releases. A refusal gets one reason, not three; every further one is a door the request comes back through.
- SITUATION
- The plant manager calls: the supplier of the new packaging line could start Monday if the interface is confirmed today.
- TRAP
- Committing on the phone and collecting the commitment from the team afterwards.
- SIGN
- On the next call the plant manager states by when he needs the answer, unprompted.
The calendar fills itself if I let it, and then I am being led. So every invitation without a purpose goes back with one question: what decision is expected from me there. If no answer comes, the meeting is dropped, and the matter gets another owner.
- SITUATION
- The week after the release is full before it starts, and not one entry came from my own planning.
- TRAP
- Closing the gap with longer days instead of fewer meetings.
- SIGN
- The next invitation from the release project names the decision it wants from me in its subject line.
I say what happened, with the date, and what it cost the shift; not a word about what I think of it. Then the request, with the date on which I check it. After that I stop justifying it; every justification makes it negotiable.
- SITUATION
- A sub-project lead has postponed the handover to production three times, and each time the shift found out that morning.
- TRAP
- Justifying the request after making it.
- SIGN
- The reply is about the next handover date, not about my tone.
Whoever takes on a task hears from me that I trust them with it, and the route stays open. In the family firm that sentence came from the owner in person, and it carried for years. In the group it is replaced by the objectives form, and that does not carry.
- SITUATION
- A developer takes over the control system that halts an entire line if it fails.
- TRAP
- Handing over task and solution together; then it was an instruction.
- SIGN
- The solution that comes back is not mine, and the line runs.
I led portal development and then led the people I had shared code with. Two of them could just as well have got the position. I spoke to them first, alone, and said the word passed over myself. Waiting for someone to come forward is waiting in vain; people who were passed over do not speak up, they work around you.
- SITUATION
- The overall lead is filled, and from Monday two colleagues at the same level sit in my status meeting.
- TRAP
- Announcing the new role to the whole team before the two one-to-ones have happened.
- SIGN
- One of the two brings the first architecture conflict after the change into the status meeting themselves.
I ask what is running, where it is stuck and where I am needed, and I answer none of the questions myself. After a stoppage, maintenance speaks before engineering and before me. Then I sit through the silence; whoever fills it themselves has opened the round only formally and leaves with the same picture they came in with.
- SITUATION
- Weekly round of engineering, maintenance and warehouse logistics after a stoppage on the night shift.
- TRAP
- Answering your own question during the pause.
- SIGN
- The cause of the stoppage in the minutes comes from maintenance, not from my guess.
An outcome has a target figure, a date and a name. Whoever distributes steps stays the only one who sees the whole and therefore has to be everywhere. A team that decides without me only comes about if it has something whole to answer for.
- SITUATION
- Connecting a second plant is due; the task can be cut into forty tickets or into one outcome with a date.
- TRAP
- Cutting the tickets yourself out of worry about the deadline.
- SIGN
- The team moves an intermediate step without asking me, and the date holds.
In the family-owned house the best is often the foreman with twenty years whom the owner trusts. In the group it is the performer with a sponsor above me. Both get the same feedback as everyone else, and in front of the team if the breach happened in front of the team. The good people watch closely what I do here, and they are the first to leave.
- SITUATION
- The most experienced developer pushes straight to production on a Friday evening, again, and this time nothing broke.
- TRAP
- Letting the breach pass because of the experience.
- SIGN
- The next Friday evening push arrives as a merge request with a reviewer.
In a matrix I lead people whose boss sits elsewhere. Authority I do not have; a date and a question I do. The meeting is every two weeks, the questions go out in writing beforehand, and any question that can be answered with yes I delete before sending.
- SITUATION
- A country unit is to adopt the target architecture but reports to the country head, not to me.
- TRAP
- Escalating through the board before the second meeting has taken place.
- SIGN
- The country unit sends its points before the meeting without me asking.
With every rollout, whether a new warehouse system or a new security policy, there are people who are against it before they know the content. So what safe operation requires is fixed beforehand, and I hold every objection against that. Whoever names a risk changes the order or the design.
- SITUATION
- Works meeting at the plant, the new warehouse management system is presented, and the pickers sit in the third row with folded arms.
- TRAP
- Making the loudest sceptic the audience of the presentation.
- SIGN
- The day after, every objection from the meeting is on the list: as a requirement, or as checked and dismissed, with the reason next to it.
The works council asks about performance monitoring, procurement about the price, the plant about downtime. I know this in advance. So the paper says what is captured, what for, who sees it and how long it is kept, before anyone has to ask. Whether and how data is captured at the machines I agree with the works council; the paper is the start of that negotiation.
- SITUATION
- Introducing machine data capture on the shop floor; the paper goes to the works council before a single device is ordered.
- TRAP
- Waiting for the question about performance monitoring instead of writing it into the paper myself.
- SIGN
- The agreement with the works council is in place before the first data is captured, and what we negotiated over was already in my paper.
Five parts: the trigger as a concrete incident, the current state in numbers, the target as a shared outcome, the measures with names, budget and end date, the proposed resolution. The current state is accepted within two sentences or the paper is dead. What I cannot translate into a person, an amount and a date is not a decision yet, it is an intention.
- SITUATION
- The security roadmap for all country units goes to the board, and the session has twelve minutes for it.
- TRAP
- Starting with the history of the topic instead of the trigger.
- SIGN
- The first question from the board is directed at one of the named people, not at me.
With the owner the decision falls at the table, and whoever comes back does so with a new argument, never the same one louder. In the group the no falls in a committee that meets again in six weeks with different people in the room. For both I need three arguments that stand independently, and I use only one per round.
- SITUATION
- Replacing the machine control system from the nineties has been rejected for the second time.
- TRAP
- Repeating the first argument because it was the best one.
- SIGN
- After a no in the group, the committee date and the next argument are in my file; after the owner's no, my file says whether the matter is closed or what I will come back with.
Reporting shows the state, not the expectation. A light I keep amber for three months because remediation is under way is a red one I withheld. Whoever brings the bad news themselves keeps the action plan; whoever lets it be found gets one imposed.
- SITUATION
- The penetration test finds a gap before the quarterly report, and fixing it takes longer than the reporting period.
- TRAP
- Reporting the remediation as in progress and not the gap.
- SIGN
- The board's follow-up is about the action plan, not about how long I had known.
DELEGATION AND COORDINATION
What I hand over and what I hold together
Delegation and coordination are the mechanics by which responsibility moves: delegation passes it one level on without getting rid of it, coordination holds it together across interfaces where no authority reaches. That is why these six rules run across the staircase, on every level, instead of sitting on top of it as a sixth.
The outcome stays whole, for the newcomer too. What changes is the distance to the first interim report: whoever has never seen something fail that was theirs delivers it within the first week and names the day themselves. With every outcome that holds, the distance grows. In the group I do not know how seasoned people are; they arrive with the project, and the first date is close for everyone.
- SITUATION
- A maintenance technician, one year in the company, plans the shutdown of a line for a weekend changeover for the first time.
- TRAP
- Cutting the job smaller so that less can go wrong.
- SIGN
- The second time he names the interim date himself, and it sits later than the first.
Whoever gets a decision from me also gets the freedom to make it differently from how I would have. I take it back in two cases: when people or plant are at risk, or when the date of the outcome can no longer be held. If their outcome slips down the order, their decision stands and the date moves with it; the reordering is mine, and it sits on the list with my name. Take a decision back without reason, and everyone knows the next handover is a test.
- SITUATION
- The head of warehouse logistics picks a supplier for the new hand scanners that I would not have chosen; budget and date are fine.
- TRAP
- Taking a quick look and reversing the choice while doing so.
- SIGN
- The next supplier choice arrives on my desk as a notice, not as a question.
In a family-owned company the owner walks through the plant and gives jobs directly to my people. I do not forbid it; I would lose, and the developer in between would lose first. Every such job gets a date and a place in the order from me, or I tell the owner that same day what will be left undone for it. In the group there is no such corridor; there the job sits in the objectives system, and nobody ever said it out loud.
- SITUATION
- The owner was on the shop floor and told the control-system developer that the display at the control station should look different by Friday.
- TRAP
- Instructing the developer to refer such requests to me.
- SIGN
- The developer is at my desk that same afternoon, before I hear it from the owner.
Between engineering and maintenance lies the control system after commissioning; between logistics and IT, the scanner. What lies in between belongs to nobody and is therefore maintained by nobody. I give it to the side the three a.m. call reaches, not the side that built it; that side gets a handover date to the side that now owns it.
- SITUATION
- After the warehouse system is commissioned, a scanner fails on the night shift; the shift calls engineering, engineering calls maintenance, maintenance says it is software.
- TRAP
- Founding a joint committee that meets every four weeks.
- SIGN
- The next night failure is in one ticket system with one name the next morning, not in three.
Engineering, maintenance, logistics and the plants each have their most urgent item. I do not negotiate urgency in the corridor; there is one order everyone can see, and whatever rises in it makes something else sink. In the family firm the owner reorders at any time, in the group the committee does once a quarter; in between I do it, with my name next to it. Whatever sinks stays decided as it was decided; only its date moves.
- SITUATION
- Plant two wants machine data capture before plant one because its customer is auditing; the head of maintenance wants the spare-parts store first.
- TRAP
- Telling both soon and keeping the order in my head.
- SIGN
- Next time the plant manager argues with his position on the list, not with urgency.
If I send someone to the plant, they carry my commitment, including the one I would have given differently. If I contradict them in front of the plant manager, they have nothing left to say next time, and the plant calls me again. The exception is a commitment that endangers people or plant, is not permissible or cannot be kept: that one I correct the same day, first with them, then with them at the plant. Everything else we settle before or after, and they deliver the correction themselves.
- SITUATION
- My sub-project lead has promised the plant a changeover date I consider too early, not dangerous; the plant manager calls me to ask whether it stands.
- TRAP
- Saying on the phone that we will take another look at it.
- SIGN
- On the next topic the plant manager calls the sub-project lead, not me.
Delegation is 16, 17 and 21, coordination 18, 19 and 20. Three rules from the staircase belong here: 05 on trust at the handover, 08 on whole outcomes, 10 on the fixed date in the matrix.
FAMILY-OWNED VERSUS GROUP
Two houses, the same decision
Twelve years I worked for an owner, four for a group. The same question gets a different answer in each house, and the difference is not a matter of style but of structure.
| FAMILY-OWNED | GROUP | CONSEQUENCE | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 01Decision path | FAMILY-OWNEDMy decisions fell at the owner's table, some in a single afternoon. | GROUPMy papers travelled through committees, each with its own calendar. | CONSEQUENCEWith the owner I had to convince in one conversation; in the group the paper had to hold up when I was not in the room. |
| 02Mistakes | FAMILY-OWNEDA mistake had a face, and the owner did not forget it. | GROUPA mistake had a ticket and a review meeting, and at the end there was often no name on the fix. | CONSEQUENCEIn both houses I named cause, responsibility and correction. With the owner my work was separating the matter from the face; in the group it was making sure the fix got a name and a date. |
| 03Budget | FAMILY-OWNEDBudget was the owner's money, and he asked what it brings. | GROUPBudget was a planning line with a year end; what was not spent by then was missing from the next plan. | CONSEQUENCEWith the owner I justified every expense as if it were my own; in the group I defended it against the year end more often than against the matter. |
| 04Proximity | FAMILY-OWNEDIt was three flights of stairs to the shop floor and one to the owner. | GROUPBetween me and the country units lay time zones and a reporting calendar. | CONSEQUENCEIn the family house proximity was there and had to be bounded, or the corridor decided. In the group I had to create it, or I would have been leading numbers. |
| 05Pace | FAMILY-OWNEDWhat the owner wanted today was on the shop floor next week, whether the architecture carried it or not. | GROUPWhat the board resolved took a quarter to reach the country units, and only there did implementation begin. | CONSEQUENCEWith the owner my work was often braking, so the pace left no technical debt; in the group it was pushing, so the decision outlived the calendar. |
| 06Loyalty | FAMILY-OWNEDLoyalty was to the name on the building; some had been there longer than I was. | GROUPLoyalty was to the project and the manager; in my four years both changed. | CONSEQUENCEIn the family house I pushed change against loyalty. In the group I built continuity against turnover, usually as documents that outlasted the change. |
What has held
These rules are not a programme and not a method. They are what I still do after twenty years, because it held in both houses. Anyone who tests them against their own organisation will disagree in places; that is where it gets concrete.
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