In today’s fast-paced business environment, organizations are under pressure to move quickly, innovate faster, and serve customers more efficiently. Yet many companies continue to burden their internal processes with excessive layers of approvals. From marketing campaigns to IT purchases, the default response in many workplaces is: “Send it up the chain.” This culture of over-approval may feel like risk mitigation, but in practice, it often results in process bottlenecks, disengaged staff, and distracted leaders.
This phenomenon—let’s call it approval overload—is a subtle but significant form of bureaucratic bloat. Rather than enabling quality control, redundant approvals slow things down without adding value. And it’s more common than you think.
Two telltale signs that an approval step is unnecessary:
1. Rubber Stamping: If an approver consistently signs off without questions or changes, their role is ceremonial, not functional.
2. Predictive Staff: If frontline employees can reliably predict whether something will be approved, it means they already understand the decision criteria and could make the call themselves.
These are signals that it's time to rethink the process.
The Hidden Costs of Over-Approval
Every additional approval adds a handoff—and each handoff is a potential delay. According to research on process optimization, handoffs are one of the most common causes of inefficiency in workflows (Hammer, 2010). They interrupt momentum, increase the chances of miscommunication, and often require follow-up or clarification, all of which slow down delivery.
On the human side, constant decision-making at every level leads to decision fatigue—a well-documented phenomenon where the quality of decisions deteriorates after a long session of decision-making (Baumeister & Tierney, 2011). Senior leaders stuck in a cycle of approvals are not only wasting time—they’re also using up their cognitive resources on low-value tasks, leaving less mental bandwidth for strategic thinking.
Shifting the Mindset
Removing unnecessary approvals doesn't mean removing accountability. In fact, empowering staff to make routine decisions can improve accountability by giving people ownership of outcomes. Clear guidelines, training, and boundaries help ensure that decisions are aligned with organizational goals—without the need for managerial checkpoints at every turn.
Forward-thinking organizations are moving in this direction. Amazon, for instance, encourages “single-threaded leadership” where one person is empowered to drive a decision or initiative forward without waiting for group consensus or top-down approval. This allows for faster iteration and a more agile organizational structure.
The Strategic Payoff
When approvals are streamlined, processes flow more smoothly, and senior leaders are freed up for what really matters: strategy, innovation, and leading their teams. Meanwhile, employees gain confidence and clarity, which can improve engagement and reduce burnout.
The path to a leaner, faster organization may not lie in adding more technology or hiring more staff. Sometimes, it starts with a simple question: “Do we really need another approval?”
Does this problem resonate with you? Aligned Outcomes has supported many organizations by uncovering inefficiencies using our Enterprise Digital Twin technology. With guidance from our exceptional team of professionals, those organizations have developed and implemented creative, sustainable solutions to a wide range of business challenges – including employee burnout. For more information about how AO can support you, contact us.
References:
· Hammer, M. (2010). Reengineering Work: Don't Automate, Obliterate. Harvard Business Review.
· Baumeister, R. F., & Tierney, J. (2011). Willpower: Rediscovering the Greatest Human Strength.
· Amazon’s “single-threaded leader” model as described in Working Backwards by Colin Bryar and Bill Carr (2021).