The steering meeting is well underway when the door opens. The executive who sponsors the programme comes in, apologises, and explains that he really has no time today. He stays for a short while. Then he leaves.
I have seen this more often than I would like, and it rarely helps. Mostly it disrupts.
Watch what happens to the room in those few minutes. Whoever is presenting goes back to the beginning, because the most senior person has just arrived and has not heard any of it. The discussion that was close to a conclusion turns into a briefing. And the decision that was about to be taken waits, because nobody wants to decide in front of the sponsor without his view, and his view is that he has no time.
When he leaves, the meeting does not pick up where it was. The moment has passed. The item moves to the next session.
The room also reads a second message, one nobody says out loud. If the person who owns this programme has no time for it, it is not the top priority. Everyone present takes that back to their own area. The line manager who was asked for two people this week now has a reason to send them somewhere else.
Formally, the programme has a sponsor. In practice, it has a title on the governance chart and a few minutes of attention, arriving at the moment they cost the most.
None of this is about one busy executive. Sponsorship is set up as a role someone holds, and nobody defines it as work someone does: which decisions only the sponsor can take, which ones the committee can take without him, and what happens when he is not there. Without that, his presence becomes a disruption and his absence becomes a veto.
What did your last steering meeting decide after the most senior person left the room?
Cordula Buss · Plan A2C / Helping finance and programme leaders build steering logic that works.