When to Step In, and When to Stay Out
Part 2 in the “From the Touchline” series
The hardest part of leading from the touchline isn’t keeping out of the detail. It’s knowing when and how not to get drawn into the detail.
Strategic leaders often operate in the grey zone between involvement and oversight. You’re not in the engine room, but you can see the steam rising. The temptation to intervene is strong, especially when pace drops, performance stutters, or a plan veers slightly off course.
But the real edge isn’t in reacting. It’s in reading the moment with clarity.
The costliest mistake a Chair or investor can make? Stepping in too late. The second costliest? Stepping in too soon.
The False Comfort of Involvement
There’s a sense of safety in involvement. When things feel uncertain, activity feels like progress. There’s board pressure, reputational risk, and the very human desire to feel useful. The phrase “just to be helpful” has covered all manner of unnecessary interventions.
But involvement isn’t neutral. It shifts the power dynamic. It creates dependency. And it often makes the team’s thinking smaller just when it needs to expand.
The best leaders I’ve worked with understand that the urge to act isn’t always a signal to act. Sometimes it’s just discomfort in disguise.
When You Shouldn’t Step In
There are moments where holding your ground, staying quiet, staying back, is the strongest move you can make.
You shouldn’t step in when:
- The team is aligned, even if they’re not doing it your way
- You’re reacting to personal discomfort rather than a material risk
- The situation is noisy, but not truly off-track
- Your presence would dilute accountability, not sharpen it
If the mission is clear, the team is engaged, and you’re struggling more with optics than outcomes, the real discipline is staying out of the way.
When You Must
But there are also moments where touchline leadership becomes active leadership. When inaction becomes a risk.
You must step in when:
- There is a clear drift from intent and no one’s calling it
- The business is confusing activity with progress
- There is silent misalignment within the team, masked by surface agreement
- Pace has collapsed and nobody is resetting the rhythm
- There is reputational or systemic risk the team can’t see from their vantage point
During my early days as an NED, I found this particularly challenging. I come from a strong operational background, and when you’re used to being responsible for delivery, it can feel unnatural, even negligent, to hold back. But I’ve come to see that good judgement from the touchline is a skill in its own right. Not stepping in doesn’t mean disengaging. It means knowing when your involvement would add value, and when it might quietly derail it.
That’s not to say boards are better off with non-operational NEDs who prefer to sit and say nothing. Often the opposite. Operational experience brings real depth, but it has to be applied with care. I’ve learnt this through training, reflection, and a fair share of hard-earned experience.
This is where strategic leaders earn their place. Not by managing tasks, but by seeing what others can’t, and acting at the right moment.
Why Clarity of Mission Comes First
One of the biggest blockers I see in boardrooms is a vague or over-engineered mission. The kind of statement that tries to say everything, and ends up meaning nothing. Often, the real issue isn’t misalignment of effort, it’s confusion over what the business is actually trying to achieve.
From experience, most boards can write a far clearer version of the company’s true mission in about an hour. When that happens, decision-making sharpens almost immediately. When I’m working with a board or leadership team, I often use a simple one-page mission sheet to craft an action oriented strategy. It includes just three things:
- The mission
- The key objectives
- And the critical results. Nothing more.
When these are written clearly and agreed upon, it becomes much easier to know when to support, when to challenge, and when to let the team get on with it. Once the mission sheet is agreed, I build the board reporting structure around it. The executive team knows they’ll be reporting against it, so naturally, they focus on achieving the key results. If the team starts focusing elsewhere, it’s usually a sign that either the mission sheet is out of date – or they’re not aligned with it. If the business needs to stabilise for twelve months to ride out a storm, say that. It’s far more powerful than a lofty line about ‘delivering excellence’ or ‘delighting customers at scale.’
What von Moltke Understood
The real role of a non-exec isn’t to dictate action, it’s to ensure clarity of intent. That means listening for drift, not just in outcomes, but in thinking. If the intent is vague, misinterpreted, or inconsistently understood across the leadership team, stepping in might mean asking a clarifying question, not rewriting the plan. This is where operational experience helps: not to provide the answers, but to spot when others are executing without the same map.
You’ve almost certainly heard the phrase,
“No plan survives contact with the enemy , or other similar phrases originating from the same.”
But you’ve probably never heard its true origins, or how deeply relevant they are to modern leadership.
It came from General Helmuth von Moltke, a highly succesful General who led the Prussian army in the 19th century. He believed that in high-stakes, fast-changing environments, detailed instructions would collapse the moment reality changed. His solution wasn’t to tighten control – it was to increase clarity.
He focused on intent, making sure his officers understood what mattered, why it mattered, and then trusted them to adapt the “how” as conditions changed. But he also expected leaders to know when to step in. Not reactively. Deliberately. When the moment truly called for it.
So successful was von Moltke’s philosophy of command, based on decentralised initiative within a clear strategic intent, that it remains the cornerstone of NATO doctrine to this day.
This balance, standing back until it’s time to lead or direct, is the heartbeat of touchline leadership.
A Simple Discipline
Before you intervene, ask yourself:
- Is this a moment or a pattern?
- Will stepping in clarify or confuse?
- Am I enabling the team or replacing their judgement?
These questions don’t just live in your head, they should be anchored in something real. That’s why I build board reporting and leadership focus around the one-page mission sheet. If your instinct says something feels off, start by looking at the mission, objectives, and key results. Is the team still tracking against what was agreed? If they are, maybe it’s your discomfort that needs examining. If they aren’t, it’s probably time to step in and reset direction.
This doesn’t require a framework. It requires clarity, discipline, and honesty, with yourself and the team.
And if you’re still unsure, ask a few clarifying questions:
- What exactly are we trying to achieve in this next phase?
- Does everyone see the same picture of success?
- What are we not saying that we should be?
- If we had to write the mission on one line today, what would it be?
These light-touch questions often unlock clarity without disrupting momentum.
The leaders who master this discipline, who know when to stay quiet and when to act with intent, are the ones who build strong teams, protect trust, and steer performance without ever becoming the centre of attention.
My Own Mistakes
I’ve stepped in too early before. I’ve overridden judgement when I should’ve built confidence. I’ve made things faster, but less stable.
And I’ve held back too long, trying to respect the team’s space when, deep down, I knew the plan had lost its way. In both cases, I learned that timing isn’t about instinct. It’s about awareness, intent, and the maturity to act on behalf of the mission, not your own need for control.
The Real Art
Touchline leadership is an art. It’s measured not in how often you speak, but in the effect you have when you do.
If you’re guiding a business, chairing a board, or supporting from the portfolio seat – this judgement is your super power.
And it gets sharper with practice.
Follow the rest of the From The Touchline Series at The Touchline Coach or subscribe for sharper thinking, grounded strategy, and frameworks for those who lead from the touchline.
