Decision Rights
In one sentence
Clear agreement on who can make which decisions, and who must be consulted first.
What it means
Decision rights spell out who proposes, who is consulted, who decides, and who is informed. They turn a vague sense of shared responsibility into something people can act on.
Four questions they answer
Who proposes?
The person or team that brings the decision forward.
Who is consulted?
Those whose input must be sought first.
Who decides?
The one person or body with final authority.
Who is informed?
Those who need to know the outcome.
Why it matters
When decision rights are unclear, decisions stall, get remade, or are quietly made by whoever acts first. Clear rights make accountability real and let issues escalate quickly.
A simple example
Illustrative scenarioAn AI tool raises a privacy concern. With decision rights in place, the project team knows the privacy lead must be consulted and the governance committee decides, so the issue is resolved rather than passed around.
A common misunderstanding
What people often thinkConsulting everyone is the same as sharing a decision.
What is closer to the truthConsultation and authority are different, and being honest about which applies builds trust. Where a decision belongs to a rights-holder, it may not be the organization's to make alone.