We are in the middle of a transition and have put two names in our Head of Product seat temporarily to prevent client confusion. Why is this joint-custody seat a disaster for our weekly Level 10 Meetings, and how do we fix it today?

Question

Tyler Smith · Accepted Answer

Putting two names in a single box on your Accountability Chart, even temporarily, is a major operational mistake. In EOS®, we teach that if two people are accountable, nobody is accountable. When you have two people sharing the Head of Product seat, your weekly Level 10 Meetings™ will suffer because issues will get bypassed, and decisions will drag on as the co-leads debate each other.

To fix this today, you must assign a single owner to the seat. If you are in transition, choose the individual who currently has the strongest GWC™ for the role and put their name in the box. The other person must be placed in a supporting seat underneath them on the chart.

If both leaders are highly valued and you want to keep them, you must split the seat into two distinct, non-overlapping functions. For instance, you can create a Head of Product Strategy seat and a Head of Product Engineering seat. Each of these new seats must have its own five roles and its own specific Scorecard measurables. This clarifies exactly who is responsible for what. Buyers look for clean, undisputed lines of command. Eliminating joint-custody seats immediately increases your organizational health and exit value.