Managing grants of authority

Grants of authority give select employees permission to spend on behalf of the company.

Managing your grants of authority can control costs by strictly limiting the amount of money your people can spend or commit the company to. The challenge is to give enough authority to allow people to effectively do their jobs, while controling overall expenditures. Test and communicate to find the proper balance.

At the same time, be alert for people subverting the system by breaking larger purchases into multiple smaller pieces to bring them within their authority.

Well-run companies have well-written grants of authority.