Knowing when to let go
I was sitting in the front of a self-driving taxi in Los Angeles last week, slightly nervous and completely removed from the steering wheel, yet somehow feeling more in control than I had all week.
One thing I’m continually learning about autonomy is that it's not about gripping the wheel tighter. It's about knowing when to let go.
As the algorithm-powered, multi-camera vehicle navigated the chaos of LA traffic with calm, almost surgical precision, I found myself thinking about all the managers I've worked for and with who insisted on driving every decision, micromanaging every turn, convinced that leadership means having your hands on everything.
They had it backwards.
The most successful leaders I know and work with understand something fundamental: true autonomy isn't about controlling everything, it's about creating the conditions where great work can happen without having to steer every moment of it.
When I rationalised it, the taxi wasn't diminishing my agency. It was amplifying it. While the car handled the cognitive load of navigation and traffic assessment, I was free to think bigger thoughts (once the nervousness has subsided of course!)
Where am I really going? What drives my best decisions? How can I better support my own journey? When should I let go?
I pose these questions to leaders too. Organisations that foster trust, create space for their teams to operate at levels they never thought possible.
I've seen too many organisations where leaders exhaust themselves trying to drive every initiative personally. They burn out their best people by refusing to delegate meaningful decisions. They create cultures of dependency instead of cultures of autonomy and capability.
In the best cultures I work with, leaders don't resist being passengers when appropriate. They recognise that sometimes the smartest way to drive your organisation forward is to let go of the wheel, trust the people and the process, and focus their energy on steering toward what truly matters.
So you know when to let go?
*And yes, I would definitely take a driverless taxi again!
