Two Simple Activities to Help Your Team Make Confident Decisions

Your organization has a clear mission. But do each of your employees have a clear purpose? 🤔

Ask a nonprofit employee why their organization exists, and they'll give you a compelling answer about the change they're creating in the world.

But ask that same person to articulate the specific purpose of their role -- how their daily decisions and actions directly advance that mission -- and you'll likely get a fuzzier response.

Most job descriptions list key tasks and responsibilities, but they don't answer the fundamental questions of, "What exactly am I working towards, and how do my decisions move us forward?" As a former in-house nonprofit staff member-turned-consultant, I remember this latter point being brushed aside in favor of other topics -- or if management wasn’t sure of the answer themselves. Back when I worked in-house, I heard, “we’ll figure it out if problems pop up” from more than one manager. 

Having consulted for 20 organizations, I see this hesitation creating predictable problems that slow down important work and create tension: 

🡆 Staff hesitate to make decisions they could make on their own 

🡆 Choices get bottlenecked at the top 

🡆 Accountability gets murky when things go wrong (or people at the bottom of the decision tree get blamed).

I want nonprofit leaders to get ahead of this problem, so that their teams can feel empowered to act and leaders can focus more on strategy and other priorities. Here are two simple actions for leaders to take to create more clarity for their staff members. I’ve seen both activities work for organizations; you can do both, or pick whichever one makes sense for your organization’s context and size: 

Activity #1: Host a team activity to connect to your purpose

Set aside time with your team and ask everyone to complete this sentence:

"My role exists to [specific purpose] so that our organization can [specific mission outcome]."

Once they complete the sentence, they can share it with the team in a small-group setting (around 3-4 people works well), to create a sense of safety while still getting the benefits of learning from their peers, which often leads to more “aha” moments. Frame it as an open, frank, and productive discussion that helps both staff and managers better understand the current role. It’s not a “gotcha” moment.

Then, have them identify their top 3-5 regular (daily or weekly) decisions and explain how each connects to their stated purpose. Talk through any gray areas with management where it's not clear who's making the call. 

When you do this, staff see more clearly how their daily work connects to the bigger picture, and decision-making hesitation starts to dissipate. 

Activity #2: Have your team members create their own decision levels map

Ask each team member create their own simple "decisions levels map" by categorizing their regular decisions into three buckets:

🟢 Green Light Decisions: "I can make this decision now without asking anyone" (e.g. Scheduling meetings with partner orgs, responding to standard donor questions, approving small purchases under $X)

🟡 Yellow Light Decisions: "I should consult with [my manager or another decision-maker] before deciding." (e.g. Bigger program decisions, responding to media inquiries, spending above $X)

🔴 Red Light Decisions: "This requires formal/written approval from [my manager or another decision-maker]." (e.g. Major policy or program changes, hiring decisions, etc.)

Then, have each person share their map with their supervisor and discuss:

• Are there any surprises? Misalignments?

• Are there "yellow light" decisions that should be "green light"?

• Are there "red light" decisions that are slowing down important work? How can we fix that?

To be clear, this isn't micromanaging; it's in the opposite direction. Making sure there is clear role purpose actually increases your staff's autonomy by giving them confidence in their decision-making boundaries. This results in staff taking more ownership of decisions they can make, while leaders focus on the choices that truly need their attention.

Great nonprofits are able to move quickly because everyone on staff knows not just what they do, but why they do it and how their decisions matter. I help my clients align their strategy, processes, and teams, so they can lead with clarity and focus their energy on their most important work.  

When we work together, I’ll conduct stakeholder interviews and identify key patterns holding you back; facilitate team workshops to solve problems and create that elusive “alignment”; provide 1-on-1 coaching support; and create simple tools, like clear decision-making frameworks, to help you get unstuck. We get clear on who on the team owns what areas and how work actually gets done, plus how it could be done better. Instead of feeling like they're always putting out fires, they’ll realize they can proactively shape outcomes instead of just responding to them.

If you’re interested in exploring this further for you or your team, send me a message or book a discovery call here.

Thanks for reading,

Dan