Leadership Essentials: Confidence

Stop Asking for Permission

It doesn’t matter if you work in a Fortune 100 company or a lean startup, a complex team or a streamlined one — there will always be roadblocks between you and your best work.

Some of those roadblocks are operational — budget, bandwidth, broken processes.
But the most frustrating ones? They’re cultural.

The culture of permission.

You need approval to move forward.
A sign-off to hit send.
A green light from someone above you — even when you already know exactly what needs to happen.

Sometimes that’s fine. Deadlines aren’t looming, and you have time to gather input and get everyone’s fingerprints on the work.
But more often than not, you’re racing the clock — and you have a choice to make:
Get permission, or get the work done.

Do you trust yourself to make that call?
Do you believe in your own expertise — enough to act without permission?

The biggest revelation for me came when I was managing a huge, national-level college bowl game sponsorship.

We signed the deal in mid-October. The game was the week after Christmas. That left me with less than 10 weeks to deliver a punchlist that made my head spin: advertising campaigns, creative assets, game-day activations, logistics, invitation lists, giveaways, and multiple large-scale events — all under the weight of a high-visibility sponsorship, driven by the CEO himself.

I was technically in charge — but it didn’t feel like it. Every decision seemed to need his input, his sign-off, his personal blessing.

But I knew if I waited for him to give me permission every time something needed to move, we’d miss the window.

That was the moment I realized: my job wasn’t to ask what I should do. My job was to decide — and tell him what I was doing.

It wasn’t always easy. He was busy, but he also had strong opinions about every detail — from the color of the signage to who was invited to the VIP tent. But I couldn’t manage this if I was constantly asking for permission to lead.

So I built a killer project plan. A detailed punchlist. A resource map and tight timeline. And I made damn sure I grabbed any time I could with him once or twice a week — not to ask for permission, but to keep him in the loop and aligned.

That’s when I stopped waiting to be anointed and started acting like the leader the project needed me to be.

That’s the thing about confidence — it doesn’t come from being chosen.
It comes from deciding you already belong.
It comes from acting like the expert you already are — not waiting for a title, a seat at the table, or an official blessing.

Too many workplaces train talented people to shrink themselves until they’re invited to speak.
That training starts early — when you’re closely managed and approvals are framed as the hallmark of good process.
It gets reinforced in top-down cultures, where following the chain of command matters more than solving the problem at hand.

And if you work under managers who hoard authority instead of building your autonomy, you end up believing that leadership is something you wait for — instead of something you claim.

But here’s the truth:
If you don’t own your expertise, no one will hand you the authority you’re waiting for.

You were hired to deliver outcomes.
And if the reason you don’t meet those outcomes is “someone didn’t approve it in time,” that’s not process — that’s learned helplessness.

That’s why I tell my teams — and now, I’m telling you:
Stop asking permission to do your job.
Be bold. Make decisions.
Communicate early and often.
And if you hit a wall, be loud. Demand the time and attention you need to succeed.

Because here’s the hard truth every leader learns eventually:
No one is more invested in your success than you.

Confidence isn’t about knowing you’ll always be right.
It’s about knowing you’ll own the outcome, either way.

That’s leadership.
No permission required.