How to spot it
- Pricing exceptions all route to one person with no written rule.
- Customers escalate directly to the owner as a matter of habit.
- Scheduling conflicts wait for a verbal decision.
- Vendor and pricing knowledge exists only in the owner's head.
- Nothing important happens during the owner's holiday.
Separate the three kinds of dependency
The first two are usually the majority and can be removed in weeks. The third is real and should not be rushed; it is the part of the job that genuinely belongs to leadership.
- Information dependency — only the owner knows. Fix by recording it.
- Authority dependency — only the owner may decide. Fix with thresholds.
- Judgment dependency — only the owner can weigh it. Fix by training, slowly.
The removal procedure
For two weeks, log every question that reaches the owner. Then sort the log: recurring questions with a consistent answer become a written rule; recurring questions with an inconsistent answer become a decision the owner needs to define; one-off questions stay escalations.
Publish the rules where the work happens, not in a document nobody opens. A rule attached to the record beats a rule in a handbook.
What to keep with the owner
- Strategy, pricing philosophy and market positioning.
- Hiring and firing of leadership.
- Exceptions that carry legal, safety or reputational risk.
- Relationships that genuinely require the principal.