How do we decide which responsibilities to stop when a seat disappears?

Question

Tyler Smith · Accepted Answer

Do not distribute a departing person's job description automatically. Review the outcomes first, then decide which work to stop, simplify, defer, or transfer.

The structure-first principle means designing around what the business now needs, rather than preserving every activity associated with its previous size. A seat can disappear while some of its accountabilities remain essential. Equally, a familiar report or meeting can disappear without creating an accountability gap.

Review the work in four groups:
- Required work: legal, contractual, financial, or operational obligations that need an owner.
- Core work: activities directly supporting the company's current customer promise and mission.
- Reducible work: activities that can run less frequently or serve a narrower scope.
- Stoppable work: activities whose value no longer justifies their demands.

For everything retained, name the receiving seat and check its capacity. For everything stopped, identify who needs to know and whether any commitment must be changed first.

Be explicit about consequences. Stopping a report is different from losing visibility into cash. Removing a coordination meeting is different from removing the handoff it supported.

Finish by updating the core accountabilities of the affected seats. Keep a visible stop-doing list alongside the revised chart so discontinued work does not quietly return. The goal is a smaller operating model, not the same operating model maintained through unpaid effort and hidden delays.