I have watched too many talented teams struggle under the weight of well-intentioned but misguided leadership. The pattern is always the same: Smart, capable people waiting for approval on decisions they are perfectly equipped to make themselves. Meanwhile, deadlines slip, opportunities vanish, and frustration builds.

The truth is uncomfortable but clear: In our current landscape of rapid change, uncertain and volatile business environment, and continued fierce competition, leaders who cannot step back and empower their teams are setting everyone up for failure.

Every organization has decision bottlenecks where everything grinds to a halt because one person needs to weigh in, approve, or redirect. I have seen brilliant brand and marketing people wait days for permission to implement solutions they could have executed in hours. When leaders position themselves as the sole arbiters of direction, they create unnecessary constraints that slow progress and more harmfully, demoralize their people. The reality is that in most cases, the people closest to the work have the deepest understanding of what needs to happen and can make better informed decisions than distant executives.

True empowerment goes beyond delegation. True empowerment means giving people the power to make meaningful decisions within clear boundaries, accepting that they might choose differently than you — the leader — would, and trusting that their judgment will often be as good as — if not better than — yours.

When team members feel genuinely empowered, they move faster, take ownership of outcomes, and innovate without needing permission. The cumulative effect of hundreds of small, quick decisions made by empowered people far exceeds what any single leader can accomplish through centralized control.

None of this works without trust, and trust cannot be faked or mandated. It must be built through consistent actions over time. Trust means believing that your team members care about the same outcomes you do, even if they approach problems differently. It means accepting that they will make mistakes and viewing those mistakes as learning opportunities rather than reasons to pull back authority. Building this trust requires vulnerability from leaders who must admit they do not have all the answers and resist the urge to micromanage when things get stressful.

The business environment rewards agility, decisiveness, and adaptability above almost everything else. Companies that pivot quickly, respond to customer feedback rapidly, and iterate continuously have distinct advantages over those bogged down by bureaucratic decision-making red tape. When every choice requires multiple approvals and lengthy deliberations, one loses the agility that modern business environments demand. The organizations thriving today push decision-making authority down to levels where information is richest and action can be taken most quickly, accepting that this approach will sometimes produce sub-optimal individual decisions in exchange for dramatically better overall responsiveness.

Moving toward trust-based, empowering leadership requires intentional change in how you operate. One can start by identifying decisions that do not truly require multiple, and senior, inputs and creating clear frameworks that help people make good decisions independently. Most importantly, one must resist the urge to step back in when things get challenging because that is precisely when your team needs to develop their decision-making muscles most.

In a world that moves faster every year, every month, every day, the ability to get out of your own way might be the most important leadership skill you can develop. Your team’s potential is waiting for you to unlock it.