It was 10:00 PM on a Tuesday, and I was staring at a presentation deck that wasn’t even mine. I was tweaking slide layouts and adjusting word choices for a project one of my best hires had already finished.
That was the moment it clicked. I was working late again, exhausted and overwhelmed, and I realized this simply wasn’t going to work.
I was so busy fixing things that didn’t actually need fixing that I had zero time left for the actual strategic work I was hired to do. My self proclaimed commitment to quality was actually the very thing hurting the quality of our work. By insisting on my own process, I was becoming the ultimate bottleneck in a company that was trying to move fast.
If You’re the Bottleneck, You Aren’t Scaling
In a growing company, the stakes are high and the pace is relentless. You are constantly stepping into roles and tasks you’ve never handled before. You hire talented, smart people to help carry the load, but then the old instinct kicks in. You want it done the right way, which is usually just your way.
I had to learn that the job of a manager isn’t to be the Super Producer. The job of a manager is to block and tackle. It is to clear the path, provide the necessary guidance, and make the team’s job easier.
Touching Everything is a One Way Ticket to Burnout
If you have to touch every single deliverable to feel comfortable, you aren’t leading. You are just a single point of failure. You cannot scale a department if every decision and every aesthetic choice has to pass through your specific filter.
When you micromanage the how, you stifle the why. I realized that if I spent my energy policing a process that was merely different than mine, I was wasting the very talent I fought to hire. If they are reaching the goal, hitting the deadline, and maintaining the standard, does it actually matter if they took a different path to get there?
From Mindless Obedience to Creative Risk Taking
The biggest shift happened in how I gave feedback. I used to look at a presentation and give a list of directives: “Change this, move that, do this.” It was efficient in the moment, but it was a long term disaster for the culture.
By handing out a list of corrections, I was inadvertently building a culture of mindless obedience. My team stopped thinking for themselves because they knew I’d just “fix” it anyway. It stifled their creativity and failed to train them for the next level. Instead of empowering them to take creative risks, I was training them to wait for my instructions.
I started leaning into coaching instead. Now, when I review a deck, I ask questions. Instead of saying “Change slide four,” I ask, “How would you address a potential objection from the finance team on this specific point?”
This forces them to think through the problem and take ownership of the solution. It often reveals they had a perfectly valid reason for doing it their way—a perspective I missed because I was too focused on my own habits. Asking rather than telling is the only way a team truly scales.
Guardrails are for Safety, Not for Steering
Don’t get me wrong. Process still matters. You have to set clear expectations and provide the guardrails that keep the ship from hitting the rocks. But you have to be judicious about where those rails are placed.
- The Guardrails: These are the non negotiables. Brand integrity, legal compliance, and core data structures. These are the must haves for the company to function.
- The Open Road: This is where your team lives. This is where they bring their own expertise and creativity to the table.
Trusting the Destination over the Map
The shift I had to make was moving toward being outcome based. Instead of giving a step by step manual, I started defining what a win looked like. I gave them the destination and the safety constraints, then I stepped back.
The result? The work got better. The team felt trusted. And most importantly, I stopped staying until 10:00 PM doing someone else’s job.
When you let go of the need for everything to look like your own work, you finally have the space to do the work that actually moves the needle. Different isn’t wrong. Often, different is exactly what the company needs to level up.