The Explicit and Implicit Layers of Unclear Decision Rights | Lai-Ling Su

Summary

Podcast Summary:

Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast: Agile Storytelling from the Trenches
Episode: The Explicit and Implicit Layers of Unclear Decision Rights | Lai-Ling Su
Host: Vasco Duarte
Guest: Lai-Ling Su
Date: February 27, 2026

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Overview

This episode centers on the critical theme of "decision rights" within agile product organizations, exploring both the pitfalls of unclear or ambiguous authority and the best practices embodied by exceptional product owners. Vasco Duarte and guest Lai-Ling Su discuss persistent anti-patterns related to decision-making, unpack layers of learned helplessness, and highlight the transformative power of leadership that leverages relationships and stewardship.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Persistent Anti-Pattern: Unclear Decision Rights

[01:23 – 06:54]

• Definition: Lai-Ling identifies "unclear decision rights" as the most recurring and damaging anti-pattern in product organizations—a failure to clarify who owns which decisions.

• Practical Example:
  Lai-Ling recounts working with a multinational’s GM (acting as CPO), frustrated that his Head of Product, despite managing a large budget, continued to escalate decisions that should have been within their remit.

  • “His head of product kept going back and deferring to the GM on decisions that were within that 10 mil range, totally within the realm of his accountability.” (Lai-Ling Su, 02:28)

• Key Insight: Often, the formal assignment of authority is not effectively communicated, leading to decision paralysis and upward delegation.

• Notable Quote:
  “Does your head of product know that he has the rights and the authority to make the types of decisions you want him to?”
  (Lai-Ling Su, 03:18)
  — This question shocked the GM, revealing the extent of unspoken assumptions.

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2. Nuances and Layers of the Problem

[03:42 – 06:54]

• Host’s Perspective:
  Vasco expands the discussion, noting that even when rights are explicitly granted, product owners may resist making decisions due to fear, inexperience, or external pressures.

  • “Are you sure your product owner believes that they can make those decisions or thinks that you allow them to make those decisions?” (Vasco Duarte, 03:42)
  • “...kind of push to that role, which is an incredibly entrepreneurial role with first no experience... also no ability to think strategically.” (Vasco Duarte, 04:41)

• Learned Helplessness:
  Lai-Ling introduces the idea that repeated experiences of disempowerment lead some product owners to “learn” not to make decisions.

  • “They handicap themselves through learnt helplessness.” (Lai-Ling Su, 04:56)

• Multiple Manifestations:
  Lai-Ling layers the issue:

  • Some don’t know their rights.
  • Some know, but aren’t equipped to act.
  • Some know, act, and are overridden—leading to cynicism and disengagement.
  • “There are both explicit and implicit unclear decision rights there as well... So there are so many dimensions and dynamics of this unclear decision rights pattern.” (Lai-Ling Su, 05:57)

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3. The Hallmarks of a Great Product Owner

[06:54 – 11:27]

• Inspiring Example:
  Lai-Ling describes an exemplary product owner she worked with recently:

  • Technically strong, commercially savvy, and a leader of both product and people.
  • Invested heavily in mentoring her team, ensuring skills growth and empowerment.
  • Excelled at breaking down silos, negotiating complex political environments, and “getting stuff done” where others couldn’t.
  • “She focused not just on her technical prowess, but on the people, politics and the performance side of product. And she used that to turn ambition into reality.” (Lai-Ling Su, 08:24)

• Notable Quote:
  “She just got stuff done when others couldn’t... hard to find people like that who can flex up and down left and right and be so malleable in their craft.”
  (Lai-Ling Su, 09:16)

• Relationship Building:
  Vasco reinforces that leadership through relationship is the key to driving outcomes in modern agile organizations.

  • “Relationships are what get things done. It's not about having a better user story written... It is about getting the right information in front of the right people and getting decisions made, triggering those decisions, kind of stewarding the process...” (Vasco Duarte, 09:54)

• Interactive Value Creation:
  Vasco references Esko Kilpi, emphasizing that value is generated through the ongoing "conversation" that takes place across all interactions, formal and informal.

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4. Stewardship Over Control

[11:27 – 11:50]

• Key Concept:
  Both agree that "stewardship" is the best way to describe the posture of successful product owners: influencing, facilitating, and catalyzing action without necessarily having full formal control.
  • “It speaks to the responsibility but not necessarily the full ownership.” (Vasco Duarte, 11:37)

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Notable Quotes

• On Unclear Decision Rights:
  “Does your head of product know that he has the rights and the authority to make the types of decisions you want him to?” (Lai-Ling Su, 03:18)

• On Learned Helplessness:
  “They handicap themselves through learnt helplessness.” (Lai-Ling Su, 04:56)

• On a Great Product Owner:
  “She just got stuff done when others couldn’t... hard to find people like that who can flex up and down left and right and be so malleable in their craft.” (Lai-Ling Su, 09:16)

• On Relationships as Leverage:
  “Relationships are what get things done. It's not about having a better user story written... It's about stewarding the process of having those decisions made.” (Vasco Duarte, 09:54)

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• 01:23 — Lai-Ling introduces unclear decision rights as chief anti-pattern
• 02:18 — Real-world example of unclear authority and its consequences
• 03:42 — Vasco probes further: the interplay of explicit permission and hidden hesitation
• 04:56 — Learned helplessness in product ownership
• 05:57 — Layers and dimensions of unclear decision rights
• 07:16 — The story of a phenomenal product owner and her multifaceted leadership
• 09:54 — Vasco and Lai-Ling reflect on the importance of relationships and stewardship
• 11:27 — The concept of stewardship in agile product leadership

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Memorable Moments

• The impactful silence when the GM realizes he never actually told his Head of Product that they owned key decisions.
• The candid reflection on how repeated disempowerment breeds passivity in product owners.
• The vibrant description of a product owner who excels by skillfully navigating politics and relationships, not just technical details.

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Further Learning

• Esko Kilpi’s work on “interactive value creation” (mentioned by Vasco, see show notes for link)
• Connect with Lai-Ling Su on LinkedIn for more tips, especially regarding politics and performance in product roles.

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This episode is a must-listen for Scrum Masters, Agile Coaches, and Product Owners seeking to understand and overcome the barriers of unclear decision rights, and to model leadership that transcends process and empowers people to turn strategy into meaningful outcomes.

Transcript

[A]

Hey there, Agile adventurer. Just a quick question. What if, for the price of a fancy coffee or half a pizza, you could unlock over 700 hours of the best agile content on the planet? That's audio, video, E courses, books, presentations, all that you can think of. But you can also join live calls with world class practitioners and hang out in a flame warfree and AI slop clean slack with the sharpest minds in the game. Oh, and yes, you get direct access to me, Vasko, your Scrum Master Toolbox podcast. No, this is not a drill. It's the Scrum Master Toolbox membership. And it's your unfair advantage in the agile world. So if you want to know more, go check out scrummastertoolbox.org membership. That's scrummastertoolbox.org Membership. And check out all the goodies we have for you. Do it now. But if you're not doing it now, let's listen to the podcast.

[B]

Hello everybody. Welcome to our product owner and DGIF episode this week with Lai Ling Su. Hey Lai Ling, welcome back.

[C]

Hey Vasco. Happy Friday.

[B]

Happy Friday everybody. So we'll talk about great product owners in a minute. But to get us started in this Friday episode, Lailing share with us what was potentially the worst product owner anti pattern you've witnessed in your career.

[C]

I laugh because this one is so persistent, but it's also one of the topics that I'm most fond of when working with product people. So unclear decision rights. That is the one thing that keeps showing up for me in the product space at all levels, over and over and over again. That is such a big anti pattern.

[B]

Can you give a more specific example? When you think about unclear decision rights, what would be something that you witnessed in practice that would illustrate that?

[C]

So as an example, I was working with a general manager in a multinational who effectively worked in the capacity of a Chief Product Officer role. And one of their biggest complaints was that his head of product kept coming to him for decisions that he thought that they should be making themselves. So for example, he'd been given, I think it was 10 mil a year to run his teams and build the products and create the outcomes that he wanted. But this head of product kept going back and deferring to the GM on decisions that were within that 10 mil range, totally within the realm of his accountability. But the GM just felt like, you know, it was getting past all the decisions upwards and wasn't able to completely let go. That was one scenario where there were unclear decision rights, because when I was in a coaching conversation with the gm. I asked him one question that stopped him in his tracks and he and I said, does your head of product know that he has the rights and the authority to make the types of decisions that you want him to? And the GM just sat there quietly in shock for a good minute or two.

[B]

So let me ask a follow up question there because I can totally see your. Are you sure your product owner believes that they can make those decisions or thinks that you allow them to make those decisions? But then I can raise you the you've already told the PO that they can make those decisions, but they still don't make those decisions because of whatever reason. And there's many could be fear, lack of experience, not being able to get the. All the ducks lined up right. Like getting all the stakeholders to agree, not, not being able to say no to the people that are pushing so many other things onto their backlog that they have no way of doing whatever they think should be done in the first place. Because what I'm thinking here, I see the GM aspect and that totally exists, but I also see this aspect of product owners, that kind of push to that role, which is an incredibly entrepreneurial role with first no experience, and we talked about that yesterday, the lack of entrepreneurial experience, but then also no ability to think strategically. We also talked about that yesterday. And so I see this kind of as a cocktail as well. Like, how do you see, do you see the same?

[C]

Absolutely, Because I think there is a degree of also learnt helplessness in this scenario where a product owner may see that their head of product or head of engineering or some other person in their realm is always constantly making the decisions. And so they go, well, they're great at making decisions, I'll just defer to them. And so they never learn to make these decisions themselves and they handicap themselves through learnt helplessness.

[B]

Yeah, I think that learned helplessness is definitely a kind of a dynamic to look out for because it detracts from even the ability to imagine that we could do better. Right. Like it keeps us in that corner waiting to be told what to do and never really even daring to share the ideas we might already even have as product owners.

[C]

Absolutely. So I think there are multiple layers to this. There's the assumption that people know what their decision rights are. And then there is the I know my decision rights, but I don't know how to make these decisions. And then there is the I kind of know what my decision rights are, but every time I go and make them I get trumped and so, you know, even if I make those decisions, somebody else comes over on top of me and undoes my decision. And so what's the point? So there are both explicit and implicit unclear decision rights there as well. You could tell somebody, but underneath it's sabotaged. Or you could have not told somebody and then made the assumption clear and everything's okay. So there are so many dimensions and dynamics of this unclear decision rights pattern.

[B]

Yeah, absolutely. And that's a great point. It's actually many potential patterns happening at the same time. But there aren't only anti patterns, there are also great, amazing product owners out there. So Lai Ling, share with us potentially the best product owner you've ever worked with. How did they work?

[C]

I'm thinking about a phenomenal product owner that I worked with about 12 months ago now, I think. And what made her phenomenal was that she wasn't just technically strong on everything you'd expect a product owner or experienced product professional to be. She was also a leader of product professionals as well. She had, I think, a team of 10 alongside her. Her team loved her because she took the time to mentor them and build their product skills out to be as strong or stronger than hers. The business loved her because she was exceptionally commercial in her thinking, her influencing and her decision making because she was thinking about customer value, revenue, expenses, profit models and marketing aspects of products long before they even built anything. And she also kept holding everyone true to doing the right thing and not just getting something out the door when the pressure was on. And then the executive team loved her because she was an incredible operator whose greatest strength was her ability to build solid, impactful relationships that transcended boundaries. And, you know, she removed the us versus them mentality that we talked about earlier in the week. And she broke down those departmental silos. She dealt with the politically charged, highly sensitive, high stakes scenarios. She negotiated with difficult personalities amongst her technology, legal compliance, sales operations peers. She removed the impediments that her teams had, like, very, very responsively. And she just got stuff done when others couldn't. And what made her great was the fact that she focused not just on her technical prowess, but on the people, politics and the performance side of product. And she used that to turn ambition into reality. And she used that to move strategy to execution. And it's really hard to find people like that who can flex up and down left and right and be so malleable in their craft. So that's what made her a phenomenal product owner in my view.

[B]

Yeah, absolutely. And for me, what stands out is this ability to build the right relationships that then ultimately allow to get things done. Because it really is, especially in software as it is at the moment. This is 2026, early 2026 as it is at the moment. It's all about people and how we relate to each other. And we need to realize that as leaders and mostly leaders that work through influence like product owners and scrum masters, relationships are what get things done. It's not about having a better user story written, having a more organized backlog. It is about getting the right information in front of the right people and getting decisions made, triggering those decisions, kind of stewarding the process of having those decisions made. And I really like one perspective on this by Esko Kilpi. I'll put the link in the show notes where he talks about this idea of interactive value creation. What he says in practice is that in software organizations he talks about knowledge organizations, but I'll focus on software for now. In software organizations, value is created in the interaction between the stakeholders in what he calls a conversation. And the conversation for him wasn't just when two people meet like we are meeting today, but it's also what goes on through the emails, the wiki pages that are created, the side conversations that happen in the corridors which we just called building relationships. Right. Like it's this idea that a conversation about a decision can can span multiple weeks and multiple events and then culminate in a relationship. And a product owner like you described that is able to build relationships, is able to steward that process over time to get decisions made and ultimately things done, which is what matters.

[C]

I love your use of the concept of stewardship. That is really really good word to using in this scenario.

[B]

Yeah, because it speaks to the responsibility but not necessarily the full ownership. Right?

[C]

Yeah, it's the spare Twain.

[B]

Exactly. That's a great way to put it. Liling. It's been an awesome week here. So many topics. We could have just gone for much more time, many more hours. A couple of bonus episode ideas already came up during this conversation. Before we go though, Lailing share with us where can people find out more about you and the work that you're doing?

[C]

Find me on LinkedIn probably the easiest way and I think we'll pop a. Yeah I also practical traders on the topic of politics and performance expectations with your job as well and so if you find me on LinkedIn, subscribe on and you'll get tricks in your as well.

[B]

Absolutely. We'll put the link to the LinkedIn page and why not everybody follow up, ask a few follow up questions. Learn together. Because that's how we grow as a community. Lailing, it's been a pleasure. Thank you very much for your generosity with your time and your knowledge.

[A]

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[B]

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