One of the cheapest, most reliable signals you can run on a delegation engagement is the quiet-week test. Tell your account manager: this Friday at 5pm I will look at my inbox for the first time in seven days. Do not touch it before then.
What you see when you open it is the truthful state of your delegation. Not the curated weekly digest. Not the dashboard. The actual inbox.
What you want to see
Under 20 unread, all flagged for a reason. Investor threads with the next action stated in the assistant’s reply. No dangling client emails older than 48 hours. One short “I need you on this” thread from your account manager waiting at the top.
What you do not want to see
Three hundred unread. Vendor emails sitting unprocessed because nobody knew the answer. Two unanswered investor questions. Anything urgent older than a day. If you see this, the problem is almost never the assistant. It is the SOPs and rules of engagement that were never written down. Spend the next Monday writing them.
