Unlocking Autonomy in Seattle

A leadership coach, Noah, talks with two design managers, Amanda and Kevin, during a workshop in Seattle about delegation.

Unlocking Autonomy in Seattle

True or false?

Noah is leading a workshop in Austin about design systems.

• True
• False

Amanda admits she steps in because she fears a cancelled project like last year.

• True
• False

Kevin realizes his team keeps asking for permission despite his previous words.

• True
• False

Amanda decides to keep local backups of her team's Figma files.

• True
• False

The managers conclude that their own past interventions taught their teams to wait.

• True
• False

Listen again and complete the sentences

• Kevin: For me, it's about team health and morale issues. If a junior designer misses a subtle accessibility detail, I feel responsible. I want to ____ , but it's hard when deadlines are breathing down your neck.
• Noah: Let's look at your decision frameworks then. Do you have clear ____ , or are they guessing what you want?
• Amanda: Oh wow. So when I stepped in last Tuesday to tweak that icon set, I completely undermined the ____ we built together.
• Kevin: Exactly the same here. I was trying to ____ , but I actually made them doubt their own choices. We need to push decisions down and genuinely step away.
• Noah: Now we're getting somewhere. ____ isn't about giving nice speeches in meetings. It's about letting them make mistakes and living with the consequences without your midnight edits.

Sources: photo by Yan Krukau on Pexels