---
id: "contrarian-four-decisions-a-year"
type: "contrarian-insight"
source_timestamps: ["§ Mistake 4"]
tags: ["contrarian", "executive-function", "delegation"]
related: ["action-limit-senior-decisions", "claim-senior-leaders-over-accountable"]
challenges: "The traditional view of executive leadership as a state of constant, high-volume decision-making."
speakers: ["Lindy Greer", "Jennifer Jordan", "Maxim Sytch"]
sources: ["governance"]
sourceVaultSlug: "hbr-seg-governance"
originDay: 7
articleStem: "hbr-sig-48-decision-rights"
sourceUrl: "https://hbr.org/2026/07/what-companies-get-wrong-about-decision-rights"
sourceTitle: "What Companies Get Wrong About Decision Rights"
---
# Senior Leaders Should Only Make Four Decisions a Year

**Conventional view:** the C-suite are the ultimate, constant decision-makers.

**Contrarian claim:** senior leaders should identify **just four major enterprise-wide decisions a year** where they are truly the only and best person to be Accountable (e.g., strategy, senior hiring, major investments) — and step out of the 'A' role for everything else. See [[action-limit-senior-decisions]] and [[claim-senior-leaders-over-accountable]].

**Challenges:** the traditional view of executive leadership as constant, high-volume decision-making.

**Enrichment tension.** The underlying goal (delegation and empowerment) is well supported — Monday.com warns that assigning the Accountable role to a high-level executive for all tasks 'instantly create[s] a bottleneck.' But the specific number 'four' is **normative and context-dependent**, not evidence-based: many governance models, especially in regulated or high-risk sectors, expect visible executive accountability across far more decisions, and boards may require it.