Most org charts at growing companies are drawn around people, not outcomes. A role gets invented for a loyal early employee, a seat gets split because two leaders don't get along, a title gets upgraded instead of a conversation happening. My view is simple: design the work first, then assign the people, and never add a seat to avoid a people decision.
Some founders will say that's cold. I think the alternative is colder, because everyone else on the team pays for it.
The problem: two charts that don't match
Every company has two charts, whether it draws them or not.
The org chart shows reporting lines and titles. Who reports to whom.
The accountability chart shows outcomes and owners. Who is responsible for revenue hitting the number, for customers being happy, for cash being where it needs to be, for the product shipping.
When those two charts match, things move. When they don't, you get the familiar symptoms: two people who both think they own the same result, a result nobody owns, a VP with a big title and no clear outcome, and a founder quietly owning five seats because nobody else was ever given them.
Why building around people fails
The common approach is to start with the team you have and arrange the boxes around them. It feels natural. These are the people who got you here.
The trouble is that it bakes today's people problems into tomorrow's structure. The loyal employee who can't do the job anymore gets a new seat with a vague title. The strong performer who's stretched too thin gets a second seat instead of help. Two leaders share an outcome because nobody wanted to pick one.
Each of those feels like a small, kind compromise. Together they teach the company that the standard bends for the right person. What you tolerate is what you teach, and people notice every time.
Design the seats first
Start with a blank page and the business you need to run over the next 12 to 18 months, not the people you have today.
For each seat, write:
- The 3 to 5 outcomes it owns. Results, not tasks. "New revenue hits plan" beats "manages the sales team."
- The authority it has. What it can decide without escalating.
- One owner. If two people own it, nobody owns it.
Only after the seats are clear do you start putting names in them.
Test the fit with three questions
For each person in each seat, ask three questions, and answer them with yes or no. "Mostly" counts as no.
Do they get it? Do they really understand the seat, the work and how it fits the rest of the company?
Do they want it? Do they actually want this job, at this pace, today? Not the title. The job.
Do they have the capacity to do it? The skill, the time, and the energy to do it well.
One "no" is a real problem. It doesn't mean the person is bad. It means the fit is wrong. Sometimes the fix is a different seat that genuinely exists. Sometimes it's a change.
Behavioral assessments can help here. But you don't need one to answer these three questions honestly. You usually already know.
The rule that keeps the chart honest
Here's the rule I hold every leadership team to:
Never add a seat to avoid a people decision. Never keep a person by shrinking the seat.
If a seat is needed, it earns its place with outcomes the business actually needs. If a person doesn't fit a seat, the answer is a real conversation, not a lower standard.
The exact words I'd use: "Here's what this seat needs to own over the next year. I want an honest answer on whether this is the right seat for you, and 'no' is an OK answer. If it's no, let's figure out what's next together."
That conversation is uncomfortable for about 20 minutes. Avoiding it is uncomfortable for years.
What to do this week
- Draw your current org chart on one page.
- On a second page, list the 8 to 12 outcomes the business needs owned.
- Put one name next to each outcome.
- Circle every outcome with two names or none.
- For each leader, answer the three fit questions with a yes or no.
Then bring the circled items and any "no" answers to your next leadership meeting as issues to solve, not side conversations.
Right Person, Right Seat
The Right Person, Right Seat tool is a free way to do this without a whiteboard. You enter your people and current reporting lines, define the seats and the outcomes they own, and see both charts side by side. It generates a short action brief for each misaligned seat and gives you a quarterly review for fit, single ownership and succession coverage.
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Danny Feldman is a 3× founder and the advisor behind Feldman Advisory. He founded and scaled Stellar to $100M in annual revenue across 15 states, raised $55M+ as a founder, and used AI to double revenue before exiting to private equity. Earlier, he recruited and trained 55,000+ sales reps at Cutco and grew a division from 1 to 58 locations. Operator to operator, he now helps founders of $1M–$20M companies get out of the middle of the business, build the leadership team, and raise capital. Book a 30-minute call →