The Delegation Death Spiral

"Delegation." That's what managers call it.

War. That's what it becomes. Without clear ownership, you're not delegating. You're creating conflict.

They have a problem they don't want to think through. Without framework, direction or constraints, they hand it to someone else.

Just "figure something out that I'll like."

Staff think hard and return with options. Managers realize it's not what they wanted, give more context, and send staff back to try again.

Now staff are guessing the manager's thoughts. Managers are frustrated staff can't read their mind.

Both sides are wasting cognitive fuel on problems they could solve in 10 minutes with clear thinking.

This is cognitive offloading warfare.

It's everywhere.

This connects to Why Nothing Gets Simpler - organizations add complexity, never subtract.

Delegation without clarity isn't delegation. It's chaos redistribution. The Momentum Engine shows how to delegate properly.