The Most Expensive Role in Your Business: The One That's Undefined
You know what costs you more than labor, materials, or equipment?
A role nobody owns.
It's the floater position. The task that "someone should be doing" but nobody explicitly owns. It's the gap in your accountability that quietly drains profit month after month.
Most business owners have no idea how much this costs them.
What Happens When Roles Aren't Defined
When nobody explicitly owns a role, something predictable happens:
Someone strong feels obligated to do it anyway. Your best people, the high performers who actually care about the business, see the work isn't getting done. So they jump in. They do it in addition to their actual job. Nobody asked them to. Nobody's paying them extra. They just can't help themselves.
Multiple people have different opinions about how it should be done. Three people, three interpretations. Each version takes time. Each version leads to rework. Minutes become hours. Hours become lost productivity—and lost profit.
Tasks fall through the cracks. When everyone owns everything, nobody owns anything. The work that's "somebody's job" often becomes nobody's job until it's a crisis.
Blame gets passed around. Who was supposed to follow up with that client? Who handles the scheduling? Who's responsible for the safety check? When roles are fuzzy, so is accountability. And suddenly you're in firefighting mode, trying to figure out who dropped the ball.
Your owner's value per hour plummets. You find yourself jumping in to do tasks you shouldn't be doing. You're not managing. You're not growing the business. You're not developing your people. You're firefighting. And when you interrupt strategic thinking to handle an undefined task you weren't prepared for, your value doesn't just go down—it evaporates.
The Real Cost of Undefined Roles
Let's be specific about what this actually costs:
Slower execution. Vague tasks mean unclear priorities. Your best people waste time trying to figure out who should do what. Projects take longer. Revenue is delayed.
Burnout for your high performers. Your driven team members jump in whenever they see something undone. They work beyond their role. They burn out faster. And when you lose a high performer, you've lost far more than their salary—you've lost institutional knowledge and momentum.
Reactive decisions instead of proactive planning. When nobody owns a role, issues don't get caught early. They accumulate until they're emergencies. Emergency decisions are expensive decisions. They cost more in time, resources, and corrective action.
Profit leaks in your bidding. Here's a big one: if your accountability chart is wrong, your cost estimates are wrong. You bid jobs based on who you think will do the work and how long you think it will take. But if responsibilities are actually floating around, your actual execution will be different—and more expensive.
Owner involvement at the wrong time. When the owner has to jump in at a bottleneck, that's not efficient. It's a band-aid. And while you're jumping in, you're not thinking strategically about growth or scaling.
Org Charts Aren't Accountability Charts
Here's where many businesses go wrong: they have an org chart, but not a real accountability chart.
An org chart shows titles and hierarchy. It answers the question "who reports to whom?" It's about structure.
An accountability chart shows who owns what outcomes. It answers the question "who is responsible for this specific, measurable result?"
These look similar, but they function completely differently.
An org chart might show "John - Field Supervisor." That tells you John has a title and reports to someone.
An accountability chart shows what John actually owns: "Ensure all job sites pass safety inspections before work begins" or "All crew members complete their time cards by 5 PM Friday." That's measurable. That's clear. That's ownership.
Here's the critical difference: When you bid a job, you're not bidding against your org chart. You're bidding against your accountability chart. If your accountability chart is wrong, your profit estimate is wrong. If responsibilities float around in reality, but your bid assumes a clean execution, you have a profit leak.
One Person Can Wear Multiple Hats (But Not Undefined Ones)
Here's where some smaller business owners get nervous: "Tommy, does this mean I need 20 different roles?"
No. One person can absolutely own multiple outcomes. Your office manager might own client communication andinvoicing and schedule coordination. That's fine.
The difference is this: Each of those outcomes is clearly defined. That one person knows they own client communication. They know what "done" looks like for that outcome. They own invoicing—and they know the standard for "done" is all invoices out within 48 hours of job completion. They own scheduling—and they know the expectation.
What can't happen is an undefined hat floating around with nobody's name on it.
How to Fix This: Three Steps
Step 1: Draw Your Accountability Chart
Take your current org chart and convert it to an accountability chart. Don't focus on names yet. Focus on outcomes.
What specific, measurable results does each role own?
- Client satisfaction on every bid?
- All estimates turned around within 24 hours?
- Safety compliance across all job sites?
- Cash collections within 30 days?
- Equipment maintenance on schedule?
Write down the outcomes, not the people.
Step 2: Find the Gaps
Now look at your chart with fresh eyes: Are there floating tasks? Things that need to happen but nobody explicitly owns?
Here's the pro tip: Put your accountability chart in front of your team and ask them. Ask your crew, your office staff, your managers: "What am I missing? Who's doing something that isn't defined here?"
You might be surprised. Your team probably knows exactly where the holes are. They've been filling them.
Step 3: Assign and Communicate
Pick one undefined role this week and assign it to someone. Make it clear: "You own this outcome. Here's what done looks like. Here's the standard. This is yours."
Something interesting often happens when you present ownership to an employee: they get motivated. People want to know what they're responsible for. They want to do good work in a defined role. Ownership is motivating.
The Communication Piece (This Is Critical)
Here's where many owners stumble: they assume common sense will prevail. They think, "Well, they'll figure it out."
Are you willing to bet your profit on that assumption?
What you're thinking and what your team is thinking probably aren't in alignment. You put the numbers on the paper when you bid. If your team doesn't share your vision of what "done" looks like, they'll execute differently than you planned—and your margins will suffer.
Communicate clearly. Leave nothing to assumption. What does "done" look like for this outcome? How will you measure success? What's the standard?
This Week's Challenge
Here's what we want you to do:
- Create your accountability chart — Outcomes only, no names yet.
- Identify the gaps — What's floating? What needs to be done but nobody explicitly owns?
- Talk to your team — Ask them what they see that isn't defined. They'll tell you.
- Assign one role — Pick one undefined task and give it to someone. Make them the owner.
- Define "done" — Make sure they know exactly what success looks like.
That's it. One role. This week.
The businesses that scale aren't the ones with perfect org charts. They're the ones with crystal-clear accountability. Everyone knows what they own. Everyone knows what done looks like. And when accountability is clear, execution is efficient and profit happens.
Your most expensive role is the one nobody owns. Stop letting that be true.
Performance Margin helps you identify these gaps by showing where your execution differs from your plan—and where your margins are slipping as a result. Let's help you get clear on accountability so you can get back to what actually matters: growing your business profitably.