A fictional service team is working late while customers wait for proposals and revisions. The owner concludes that the team is too small. This constructed teaching scenario explores another possibility: ordinary work is waiting for decisions that only the owner believes they can make.
No company, person or engagement is represented. The sequence illustrates a diagnostic method rather than claiming that a particular intervention produced a client result.
The situation
Colleagues prepare work, but every price adjustment, delivery date and minor change returns to the owner. The owner is also selling, reviewing finance and meeting customers. The approval queue grows whenever those responsibilities overlap.
A new hire might improve preparation capacity. It would not necessarily improve the rate at which approvals are completed. More prepared work could accumulate in front of the same constraint.
What everybody thought the problem was
The first explanation is insufficient effort or headcount. Both deserve examination, but neither should be accepted before the work is traced. Activity and completed output are different measures.
The investigation would record when work becomes ready, when approval is requested and when a decision arrives. It would also identify why approval is required in each category.
What the diagnosis would test
Some decisions may genuinely require the owner's judgement. Others may need only a clear boundary, current information or a documented rule. The useful question is which ordinary decisions can safely move to a capable colleague.
The review would examine the consequences of error and the person's preparation. Delegation without information or authority would not address the problem.
What could be changed
A bounded pilot could give one colleague authority over a recurring low consequence decision within an agreed limit. Exceptions would still be escalated. A short decision log would preserve visibility without requiring permission for every action.
The pilot would compare waiting time, quality and the number of escalations. Any improvement would need to be observed before being claimed. The scenario does not supply invented percentages.
What might not work
The boundary may be unclear. The owner may continue overriding acceptable decisions, causing the colleague to seek approval again. The person may need training or access to information. These are different obstacles and should produce different responses.
The pattern
A request for more staff can conceal a decision design problem. Before hiring to address delay, map where the work waits and who has authority to move it. Choose one recurring decision and make its owner, limits and escalation route explicit.
The person behind the thinking
Ayodeji Peter Falope
Business diagnosis, practical decisions and stronger operating systems for Nigerian and African SMEs.