Vol 2. The Cost of Doing It For People
Holding What Matters: Leadership, Capacity, and Responsibility
I know I’m not alone when I say that the start of 2026 has been intense.
I was on my son’s Make-A-Wish trip to Disney World, soaking up so much magic and joy, when I learned that Alex Pretti had been killed by a federal agent in Minneapolis. It felt like an alternate universe. The cognitive dissonance of witnessing current events against the backdrop of Disney was enough to cause whiplash.
I found myself reflecting that my son’s cancer treatment may have prepared me for times like this because it taught me how to hold tiny, present-moment joys against a backdrop of horror and hard. Those little moments can be grounding and recentering so I can face what’s in front of us.
And despite all of what’s happening now, many of us still have to show up to work.
In times like these, it’s so important that we make sure we’re not holding more than what’s ours to carry. That theme brings me to my second installment of my 2026 series “Leadership Lessons from Community Organizing”: the cost of “doing it for” people.
Enjoying a day in the alternate universe that is Hollywood Studios.
Vol 2. The cost of “Doing It For” People
“If you think you can do it for the people, you’ve stopped understanding what it means to be an organizer.” -Fred Ross Sr.
In my work with managers, I hear this all the time: I could work with my direct report to do this, but if I did it myself it would go so much quicker and it would be done how I want it.
And sometimes that’s true, at least in the short term
Supporting people to do the work themselves takes more time and intention. It is rarely ever the quickest path. It requires patience and investment but it builds trust, strengthens relationships, and allows people to grow into their own capacity.
When I was a young organizer, I learned this lesson the hard way. I was organizing on a campaign on Michigan State University’s campus to shut down the on-campus coal plant that was making students sick. We had a lot of new volunteers and enthusiasm on the campaign, but, as a new organizer, I was hesitant to ask them to take on more responsibility.
The first semester I held on closely to the different responsibilities on the campaign and I found myself burning out and working long hours.
The next semester I focused on delegating pieces of the campaign to my volunteers. I asked a long-time volunteer to become our media coordinator to coordinate media events throughout the semester. Early on, he organized a media event to bring visibility to the campaign.
As I took a backseat, he ran a successful event and secured a featured quote in the student newspaper. It was a turning point for the campaign, and he felt such pride having led a successful event. I felt relief too because I had a significant portion of work off my plate.
What I understand now is that this wasn’t my work to hold in the first place. As the organizer, it was more important for students to be the voice of the campaign, not me.
Doing it for people may mean it gets done the way you want, but it is often a disinvestment in the relationship. It robs someone of the opportunity to deepen their skills, confidence, and commitment to the work. It can quietly communicate distrust. And over time, it strains relationships, sometimes even leading to resentment because you’re always doing work that isn’t yours.
By holding onto that piece, I was carrying something that wasn’t mine to carry. When I let go, I invested in his growth. He flourished and the campaign was stronger because it wasn’t centered on me.
Spaciousness for Courageous Leadership
I once supported a manager who was deeply unhappy managing their team. They were experiencing burnout and knew they needed to delegate, but kept defaulting to answering questions or taking things back because it felt easier. This wasn’t the work they wanted to be doing anymore, but they were stuck in doing mode instead of delegating.
Through our work together, they committed to fully transferring ownership to their direct reports and something finally shifted. Within months, they were less overwhelmed. And they felt free enough to start asking bigger questions about their own path. They had more space and capacity to discover what might be next for themselves because they weren’t holding onto things that were no longer theirs to carry.
I was thinking about this recently as I finished Eveline Shen’s book The Courage to Lead Against the Current. Shen maps out a courageous operating system for leaders to assess their capacity. The whole book is a must-read. What stood out to me this time is that she names Spaciousness as an essential component of courageous leadership.
In my experience, spaciousness can feel distant for many leaders right now. But it is absolutely essential in times that demand our strength, courage, and discernment.
Shen offers a few strategies for creating spaciousness: stop, delay, delegate. What can you take off your plate? What can you move to a longer timeline? What can you delegate to trusted team members?
This is not only an investment in your own leadership capacity, it’s an investment in your team’s.
The ripple effects of doing it for people when it’s not yours to do can be long-lasting. It can hold you in a grip when you could be free to focus on something more interesting, more strategic, and more aligned.
If you embraced delegating something you’ve been putting off, what might you be free to focus on instead?
I’d love to hear your reflections.
I'm grateful to have you along for this exploration of leadership and organizing. If these reflections are valuable to you, please consider sharing them with a friend who might benefit. And if you’d like to continue the conversation, you can always reply to this email. I read every response.
In solidarity,
Michaela