Leadership · People · March 4, 2025 · 7 min read
Right People, Right Seats: Why Your 'People Problem' Is Almost Always a Clarity Problem
The hardest conversation in any $5M company isn't firing someone. It's admitting that the seat itself was never clearly defined in the first place.
Every leadership team I sit down with eventually says it: 'We have a people problem.' Sometimes it's a specific name. Sometimes it's a vague feeling that 'the team isn't where we need it to be.' Almost always, the underlying issue is not the people — it's the absence of clarity about what each seat is supposed to deliver.
Right People vs. Right Seat
EOS draws a clean line between two questions, and most companies blur them.
- Right Person = lives your Core Values. Not 90% of the time. Consistently.
- Right Seat = Gets it, Wants it, has the Capacity to do it (GWC). All three. Not two out of three.
A high performer who doesn't live your values is a Wrong Person in a Right Seat — and they will quietly destroy your culture. A beloved long-tenured employee who can no longer GWC their role is a Right Person in a Wrong Seat — and they deserve an honest conversation, not silent resentment.
Why $5M companies get stuck here
At $1M, you hire generalists who do everything. At $5M, those same generalists are now sitting in seats that need specialists, and the company has outgrown them in the role — even though they're still great humans and culturally aligned. The founder feels guilty, the leader feels overwhelmed, and the team feels the gap. Nobody says it out loud.
The Accountability Chart conversation
Before you have any people conversation, draw the Accountability Chart for the company you need 12–24 months from now — not the one you have today. Each seat has 3–5 measurable accountabilities. Then put the right name in each seat. Sometimes the answer is 'open' — and that's progress, not failure.
“You cannot hold someone accountable to a seat you've never defined. Most 'people problems' dissolve the moment the seat is written down honestly.”
Three honest questions for your leadership team
- 01If we were hiring this seat today, would we hire the person currently in it?
- 02Do they Get it, Want it, and have the Capacity to do it — all three, today, in the seat we actually need?
- 03Are we tolerating below-the-bar performance because of tenure or guilt?
If the answers are uncomfortable, that's the work. The companies that scale past $10M are the ones whose leaders are willing to have the clarity conversation — with the seat first, then the person.
If you want a guide for that conversation, I work with leadership teams as an EOS Implementer in Fort Collins and virtually nationwide.