When a task is late, several people may say they were involved and still be unable to say who owned the outcome. Start with one real workflow rather than rewriting every job description.
1. Choose a recurring decision
Pick something that crosses roles: a customer complaint, an exception to a roster, approval of a purchase or a handoff between sites. Use a recent example. Write down what had to happen, who touched it and where it stopped.
2. Separate the work from the decision
For each step, identify who does the work, who can make the decision, whose input is needed and who must be told afterward. Those can be different people. A useful decision map makes one role accountable for the outcome and states the boundary of its authority.
| Question | Write down |
|---|---|
| What triggers this work? | The event, request or threshold that starts it. |
| Who owns the outcome? | One role responsible for seeing it through. |
| Who can decide? | The decision maker and the limits of their authority. |
| Who contributes? | People who provide information or carry out steps. |
| When does it escalate? | The exception and who receives it. |
3. Test the map on an actual example
Ask the people involved to walk through the last case. If they disagree about the owner or approval point, capture where the versions diverge. A chart or position description may describe the intention while the actual workflow reveals what happens.
4. Change one decision at a time
Write a short decision statement: “The site manager decides routine service recovery within the agreed limit; the regional leader decides exceptions above that limit.” Replace the example and threshold with those appropriate to your business. Tell affected teams, update the procedure and check the next few cases.
5. Check whether the role can carry it
Clear ownership will not solve a capacity or capability gap on its own. If a role now carries too many decisions, use Task Mapping to examine its workload. If the issue is a skill or support gap, the People Matrix can structure a development discussion.
One page showing the decision, its owner, authority boundary, contributors and escalation point. Test it against a real case before changing the organisation chart.
For a broader diagnosis, read why roles and accountability become unclear and how CLEAR Structure and Roles fit into the operating model.