**Found:** a real genre of workplace permission. The purchase request for a forty dollar tool needs six approvals. Your manager signed it on day one. Security wants a forty-two question vendor form. Procurement and a finance VP sit after that, and neither has heard of you. The deadline in the justification box passed while the request sat at step four.  You have filed this request and watched the tracker move one box a week. You have also paid for the tool yourself in the end, because the client still wanted the diagrams on Friday. ## The dry line You were handed the deadline and none of the budget. The approval chain did not remove the risk. It moved the risk onto your deadline. Count the approvals between you and a forty dollar decision, and you will know how much control the role really has. Ask for a small spend limit in writing at your next review. If the answer is still six signatures, price that friction into how you judge the job.