Ownership Trio

The Ownership Trio is a framework that defines true ownership as requiring three interdependent components: Knowledge, Mandate, and Responsibility. All three must be present for effective ownership.

The Three Components

Knowledge

Understanding the system, product, or service you’re responsible for. This includes:

• Technical understanding
• Business context
• User needs
• Operational realities

Mandate

Authority to make decisions and take action. This includes:

• Decision-making power
• Ability to allocate resources
• Authority to change processes
• Control over outcomes

Responsibility

Accountability for consequences. This includes:

• Being on-call for issues
• Handling alerting and debugging
• Rearchitecting when needed
• Owning the outcomes (good and bad)

The Interdependence

The three components work together in a cycle:

1. You cannot be responsible for something you don’t control. You need the mandate.
2. You cannot use that mandate effectively over something you don’t understand. You need knowledge.
3. You gain knowledge only if you are fully responsible for the consequences of your mandate.

Why It Matters

When all three components are present:

• Teams can make effective decisions
• People feel empowered and motivated
• Systems improve through learning
• Accountability is clear

When components are missing, you get [[Broken Ownership Archetypes]] that lead to frustration, demoralization, waste, and poor operations.

Related Concepts

• [[Broken Ownership Archetypes]] — what happens when components are missing
• [[You Build It You Own It]] — philosophy of full ownership
• [[RACI Matrix]] — responsibility assignment framework
• [[Intrinsic Qualities in Hiring]] — ownership as an intrinsic quality
• [[Platform Engineering]] — building with ownership

Source

• [[6 Archetypes of Broken Ownership]] by Alex Ewerlöf