You say you want motivation. You want people who solve problems before they escalate. You want a team that doesn’t need constant direction.
But here’s the truth: you can’t demand ownership. You have to create the conditions for it.
Most leaders approach ownership backwards. They think it’s something people either have or don’t have. A personality trait. A work ethic issue. Something to screen for in interviews.
That’s not how it works.
Ownership is a mindset. And like any mindset, it’s shaped by environment, reinforcement, and example. If your team isn’t taking ownership, look at what you’re teaching them through your daily actions.
Give control, not just responsibility. You can’t tell someone they own something and then override their decisions. That’s not ownership. That’s following orders with extra steps. Real ownership means people have the authority to make calls, take risks, and learn from what doesn’t work. If you’re not willing to let them fail occasionally, you don’t want ownership. You want compliance.
Stop rescuing problems you’ve delegated. Someone’s struggling with a challenge you gave them. Your instinct is to jump in and fix it. Resist. When you consistently take back ownership at the first sign of difficulty, you train your team to wait for you to solve things. Ask questions instead. Offer perspective. But let them own the solution, even if it takes longer than if you’d done it yourself.
Reward initiative, not just results. Someone tries something new and it doesn’t work. How you respond in that moment determines whether they’ll take initiative again. If you focus only on the failure, you’ve taught them that trying isn’t worth the risk. If you acknowledge the thinking behind it and help them learn from it, you’ve reinforced that ownership means taking intelligent risks.
Be clear about what “good” looks like. People can’t own outcomes they don’t understand. Vague directions create dependency. If you want someone to truly own a project, they need to know what success means, what constraints exist, and what trade-offs are acceptable. Clarity isn’t micromanagement. It’s the foundation of autonomy.
Get out of the way. This is the hardest part for most leaders. You see a faster path. A better approach. A way to avoid a mistake you made years ago. And you’re tempted to redirect. Don’t. Unless the risk is catastrophic, let them find their own path. The ownership mindset develops when people navigate challenges themselves, not when they follow your roadmap.
I worked with a VP who couldn’t understand why his team always waited for his input. “I’ve told them a hundred times to just make the decision,” he said.
We looked at what happened when they did. Every time someone made a choice, he’d ask detailed questions about why they chose that approach. Not curious questions. Interrogating ones. “Did you consider this alternative?” “Why didn’t you do it this way?” “Have you thought about what happens if…”
He thought he was developing their thinking. They heard “you made the wrong choice.”
Within months, nobody made decisions without checking with him first. He’d accidentally trained them that ownership meant getting his approval, not exercising their judgment.
We changed his approach. When someone made a decision, he asked one question: “What do you need from me to make this successful?” That’s it. No second-guessing. No suggesting alternatives. Just support.
His team transformed. People started making calls confidently. They experimented. They came to him with solutions, not problems. Not because he gave a motivational speech about ownership. Because he stopped punishing them for taking it.
That’s what embracing the ownership mindset really means. It’s not about demanding more from your team. It’s about examining what you’re doing that prevents them from stepping up.
Every time you revise someone’s work without explaining why, you teach them to wait for your edits. Every time you solve a problem they could have solved, you teach them you don’t trust their capability. Every time you focus on what went wrong instead of what they learned, you teach them not to try.
But every time you let someone struggle through a challenge and succeed, you build their confidence. Every time you support a risky decision even when you would have chosen differently, you demonstrate trust. Every time you celebrate smart failures, you create safety for innovation.
The ownership mindset isn’t about working harder or caring more. It’s about feeling genuinely responsible for outcomes because you have the authority, support, and safety to influence them.
You can’t tell people to embrace that mindset. You have to create the culture where it naturally emerges.
Stop asking why your team won’t take ownership. Start asking what you’re doing that makes ownership feel risky, unclear, or unrewarded.
The answer to that question is where real change begins.
What will you stop doing this week to make room for your team’s ownership?
If you’re ready to build a true ownership culture in your organization, schedule a call with me.
#OwnershipMindset #LeadershipDevelopment #ExecutiveCoaching