Autonomy, now with a process owner.
The new department is free to challenge conventional thinking, provided the challenge is submitted using the conventional template. Teams may experiment, take intelligent risks, and question inherited assumptions during the designated experimentation window on alternate Thursdays.
We have deliberately placed the department outside the existing business units. This gives it the independence to request information from all of them without having the authority to obtain it. A liaison will be appointed to each relationship. The liaisons will meet to establish a common approach to reducing handoffs.
Its director reports directly to the chief executive, except for staffing, procurement, security, finance, brand, facilities, client acceptance, and decisions. Those remain with the functions best equipped to explain why Tuesday is difficult.
Give the startup somewhere to stand.
Our internal incubator occupies a converted meeting room. Facilities has approved beanbags in principle and requested a load assessment. The whiteboard is available immediately, although permanent ideas require submission to the knowledge-management platform.
Every team receives a founder title. Founders are encouraged to behave like owners, particularly when working late, while remembering that ownership does not extend to budget authority, equity, or choosing a different videoconferencing platform.
Failure is celebrated as learning. To preserve accountability, each learning event must include a statement explaining which employee failed, why the failure should not recur, and how the organization can claim to support experimentation without experiencing it twice.
THE FIRM’S WORKING MODEL
The permission to act pipeline.
- 01Request autonomy
Explain why the team should decide.
- 02Review autonomy
Obtain agreement from teams that disagree.
- 03Approve a pilot
Allow one decision within the approved decision area.
Pilot identifies need for a permanent autonomy office. Return to step 1.
Measure how quickly we discuss moving.
The department’s leading indicator is decision velocity: the number of decisions transferred to another forum per week. This distinguishes it from decision completion, which is more difficult to improve without changing how the company works.
A team that forwards twelve decisions has demonstrated twice the velocity of a team that forwards six. The fact that both teams are waiting on the same purchase order is a downstream dependency and therefore outside the innovation scorecard.
Early progress is encouraging. The launch announcement took one morning. The shared mailbox took three days. Permission to buy the software mentioned in the announcement has reached the appropriate authority, who is attending a conference about speed.
Preserve the option to reorganize.
If the department succeeds, its methods will be incorporated into the core business through a carefully sequenced integration program. If it struggles, the firm will establish whether it needs greater independence or closer alignment. Both findings support an additional structure.
There is a simpler route: identify who can approve a bounded decision, give that person a clear budget and deadline, and let the team deliver something. We have recorded this suggestion in the backlog. It currently lacks an executive narrative.
SoftBoulders expects the Department of Faster Decisions to transform the firm. Its first decision is scheduled for consideration at the next meeting about whether it needs a meeting.
Behind the brief: KPMG
KPMG announced its Client Technology & Innovation group on September 22, 2026 to develop AI-native businesses and scale products. The plan includes startup-style ventures and leadership rotations. SoftBoulders’ approval process below is our own comic response.
News date: Sep 22, 2026. Article published: Oct 6, 2026. The policies and proposals in this article are SoftBoulders’ comic response; the linked sources describe the underlying events. Editorial notes.
