Any long term readers (all three of you) of this blog know that I I love finding parallels between Dungeons & Dragons and teams in the workplace. This is not because adventuring parties are particularly effective organisations. Rather, a group of players all representing characters with different skills, goals and outlooks all come together to beat a common goal. Remarkably similar to teams in the real world. Something that drives both the players of the game and team mates at work is autonomy.
In game players have the freedom to decide what their characters do. Of course, those decisions should matter. It is not at all surprising that the same principle sits at the heart of creating a motivated and engaged workplace.
Autonomy is more than freedom
In his book Drive, Daniel Pink identifies three key elements that underpin motivation in modern workplaces: autonomy, mastery and purpose. Autonomy is the desire to have some control over what we do, how we do it, and sometimes when we do it. It doesn’t mean everyone gets to do whatever they want. A workplace without structure would quickly descend into something resembling a badly managed D&D campaign. Everyone would have their own objectives, nobody would know what anyone else was doing, and the person responsible for payroll would probably be hiding in the woods.
Autonomy exists within boundaries.
A D&D game has rules, a setting, a Dungeon Master, a scenario and consequences. Players aren’t free to rewrite reality whenever they want. But within those boundaries, they should have enormous freedom.
The DM might tell the players:
“You have arrived at the gates of the marble city.”
What happens next is up to them. They might walk brazenly through the gate. Or perhaps they sneak in through the sewers at night. Of course, they might decide the city is clearly too dangerous and wander off in completely the opposite direction. The important thing isn’t that the players get everything they want. It’s that they get to choose.
Choices need consequences
I’ve gone into this in more detail in my previous article and I don’t want to cover the same ground. But there is an important distinction between giving people choices and giving people meaningful choices. Railroading is taken badly by the roleplaying community for a reason.
At work we can ask employees for their opinions, run surveys, hold meetings and invite suggestions. But if every decision has already been made, people quickly learn that their participation is decorative only. Autonomy requires more than asking people what they think.
People need to believe that their decisions can change something. That doesn’t mean every suggestion must be accepted. Just as the DM doesn’t have to allow every player plan to succeed, managers can’t accommodate every idea. But when someone makes a decision, we should be able to explain why it mattered.
The D&D player needs agency
Lets consider two different D&D games. In the first, the DM has written an elaborate story. The players are expected to follow the plot from A to B to C. They meet the NPC the DM has prepared, discover the clue the DM wants them to discover, travel to the location the DM has selected and fight the villain waiting there. While the adventure might be beautifully written the players can begin to feel like passengers.
In the second game, the DM establishes a world, creates problems and introduces characters with their own motivations. Then the players decide what they want to do. The DM responds to those decisions. The players might ignore the obvious villain and become obsessed with helping a farmer recover a stolen cow. They might make friends with the Sheriff who was supposed to be an antagonist. Instead of entering the carefully prepared dungeon they might go straight to the castle, because they found another way to deal with the evil necromancer.
For the DM, this can be terrifying. However, for the players, it can be fantastic. Because now the story belongs to them too. Their choices shape what happens next. That is agency. One of the great pleasures of roleplaying games.
The workplace needs agency too
Lets look at a workplace that gives people responsibility without giving them control.
- “You’re responsible for delivering this project, but I’ll decide how you do it.”
- “I want you to take ownership, but please run every decision past me.”
- “I’d like you to develop professionally, but here’s exactly what you’re going to work on.”
These approaches can create accountability without autonomy which eventually leads to people feeling like they don’t own their work. Instead, they become characters following someone else’s adventure path.
A more autonomous approach might sound like:
“Here’s the outcome we need. Here’s the timeframe and the constraints. How would you approach it?”
Now the employee has something to solve. They can bring their expertise to the problem and make their own decisions. Of course, by doing so they can learn from the consequences.
That is much closer to playing a great game of D&D.
The DM doesn’t disappear
Now, beware, because there is a trap here. If autonomy is so good, it can be tempting to conclude that managers should simply get out of everyone’s way. But that’s not what autonomy means.
The DM still has a critical role. They establish the world, create challenges, introduce consequences and maintain the rules. On occasion they have to tell the players, “No, your wizard cannot summon an ancient dragon just because you rolled a natural 20.”
Good managers do much the same. They establish expectations and boundaries, while providing resources and support. Where possible they help remove obstacles and make sure people understand both the objective and the constraints.
Ultimately, they allow people to decide how to get there. The skill is knowing when to intervene and when to let the players play.
Autonomy creates ownership
One of the most interesting things about D&D is how quickly players become invested in decisions they have made themselves.
If the DM tells the party that they must defeat the corrupt town mayor, the players may care. But if the players decide that the mayor needs to be brought down because of the way he’s been bullying their characters families, the objective becomes personal. They are fully invested.
Of course, the same thing happens at work. People are more likely to feel ownership over an outcome when they have had a genuine role in determining how they will achieve it. Telling the team “We need to deliver this project by the end of the month, within this budget, while meeting these quality and safety requirements,” creates the playing field. the team then decide how to play the game. That’s autonomy.
Failure is part of autonomy
There is one final lesson that D&D offers us. If players are genuinely making decisions, sometimes they are going to make bad ones. They will open the trapped chest (there might be treasure inside…) or split the party (haven’t horror movies taught us anything?). Sometimes they will charge the ancient green dragon head on.
If we want to create autonomy for our teams at work, we have to accept the same reality. People will make mistakes. The answer isn’t to remove their ability to make decisions. Doing so creates a workplace where the safest strategy is to ask permission for everything.
Instead, we should distinguish between acceptable failure and unacceptable failure. A junior employee making a poor judgement call on a low-risk task can be an opportunity for learning. A decision that creates a serious safety risk is completely different.
Boundaries do matter. Within those boundaries, however, people need enough freedom to experiment and develop their judgement.
That’s how mastery develops too. And Pink’s three elements begin to connect.
- Autonomy gives people the opportunity to choose.
- Mastery gives them the opportunity to get better.
- Purpose gives them a reason to care.
Let the players play
When thinking about autonomy, perhaps the biggest lesson D&D offers managers is surprisingly simple: Don’t write the players’ story for them. Give them the objective and resources. Explain the boundaries before letting them decide what to do.
The same is true at work. If we want people to take ownership, solve problems creatively and become more capable, we need to give them opportunities to exercise judgement.
We need to move from: “Here’s what I want you to do.” towards: “Here’s what we’re trying to achieve. How do you think we should do it?” That small change can transform the relationship between a manager and an employee. One makes someone a participant. The other makes them an owner.
Perhaps that is why D&D continues to be such a useful mirror for the workplace. The best games aren’t about the Dungeon Master telling everyone what happens. They’re about creating a world where people’s choices matter.
The best workplaces aren’t either.