By Ann Marie van den Hurk, Mind The Gap Advisory
When Decision Authority Is Undefined, Legitimacy Gets Borrowed
There’s a pattern that shows up in almost every modern crisis. It’s subtle. It’s rarely named. And it’s often misdiagnosed.
When decision authority is unclear, organizations start borrowing legitimacy from communication processes. Not intentionally. Not politically. Just pragmatically.
Under pressure, leaders don’t ask, What should we do?
They ask, What can we say?
That shift matters.
Questions about messaging, timing, and public posture aren’t wrong. But when they become the primary path to action, it signals that decisional authority hasn’t been fully defined for the moment at hand.
Executives don’t hesitate because they don’t know what to do.
They hesitate because they don’t know whether they’re allowed to do it yet.
Allowed by legal.
Allowed by regulators.
Allowed by the court of public opinion.
So they wait. And often, permission arrives in the form of language.
Once something can be said, it feels sanctioned. Once it’s been said, it feels owned.
This places an unfair burden on communications teams. Language becomes a proxy for authority. Messaging absorbs risk it was never meant to carry.
This isn’t a failure of communications. It’s a failure of governance design.
When authority is explicit, leaders don’t need words to legitimize action. Decisions stand on pre-defined authorization, not post-hoc explanation. Communication follows authority instead of substituting for it.
That distinction matters most when verification is breaking down and facts are incomplete.
In those moments, authority is the stabilizing force.
Not speed.
Not certainty.
Not messaging.
When decision authority is undefined, legitimacy gets borrowed. When authority is clear, legitimacy holds.
Pressure-test your decision authority before it’s tested publicly.
The CrisisOS5™ Executive Crisis Readiness Diagnostic helps leadership teams identify where authority is unclear, borrowed, or silently deferred under pressure.
Run the diagnostic to examine whether your organization is designed to decide when facts are incomplete and scrutiny is immediate.
Ann Marie van den Hurk, MSc., APR is the founder of Mind The Gap Advisory and originator of the CrisisOS5™ Framework. She advises CISOs, General Counsel, Chief Risk Officers, and boards on decision authority and executive crisis readiness for the AI era. Based in Newport, Rhode Island — serving organizations in Providence, Boston, Portsmouth, Portland, and Hartford, and across New England, nationally, and globally. mindthegapcyber.com
Frequently Asked Questions
Why does communication become a substitute for decision authority during crises?
When authority is unclear, leaders look for legitimacy before acting. In many organizations, communicable actions feel safer than decisional ones, so language becomes a proxy for permission.
Is this a communications problem or a leadership problem?
It’s neither. It’s a governance problem. Communications teams end up carrying decisional weight because authority boundaries were never clearly defined for moments of uncertainty.
Why does this show up more often in AI and cyber incidents?
Because verification lags speed. When facts are incomplete and scrutiny is public, leaders hesitate unless they already know what actions are permitted before certainty is restored.
What happens when legitimacy is borrowed from language?
Decisions slow, risk shifts onto messaging, and authority becomes improvised in public. That dynamic increases legal, regulatory, and reputational exposure.
How can organizations prevent this dynamic?
By defining decision authority, escalation thresholds, and permissible actions in advance, especially for scenarios where evidence may be contested or incomplete.