In her Dare to Lead™ toolkit, researcher Brené Brown offers a powerful rumble tool to guide the five ‘C’s of strategic thinking, decision making and delegating (also known as ‘Let’s Paint Done’): Context, Colour, Connective Tissue, Cost and Consequence. 

In my work as a leadership development facilitator and executive coach, I’ve seen people use this as a tool for on-the-spot delegation, as an agenda framework for an important strategy discussion with disgruntled stakeholders, and as a checklist for an acquisition opportunity. I’ve even had one leader tell me she was going to use it with her family for their upcoming holiday aspirations!

The genius of this model is that it gifts both askers AND receivers the opportunity to think more fully about the task/issue. Often, leaders delegate, thinking team members can read their minds about what is expected, or ‘common sense’, or implied. Walking through this framework gives everyone involved a better chance of being anchored, aligned and accountable.

Slow Down To Go Faster

Some leaders might hesitate to take the time to walk through the process, only to then get outcomes not aligned with expectations which takes up even more time to rework and resolve. Einstein knew better!

“If I had an hour to solve a problem I’d spend 55 minutes thinking about the problem and 5 minutes thinking about solutions.” – Albert Einstein

You can find the original model here. Below, I’ve added in a few bonus points, resources, a sixth C and examples in action:

1. Context

No one has optics on everything that’s going on in an organisation.

  • What’s happening in other areas that will impact or be impacted by this decision or deliverable?
  • Is there history or previous experience that we need to understand?
  • Is there a broader context we need to discuss (geopolitics, supply chain, unspoken expectations; do we need vettings or briefs on partners, etc.)?

2. Colour

Setting a clear intention and painting the fullest, most detailed picture you can.

  • Can you describe your vision of what this looks like or how it works?
  • How would you assign the level of importance, seriousness, and urgency?
  • Is this ideation and brainstorming, or are we going to do this? If this is ideation and “throwing out ideas,” how will we know when or if it moves to a serious plan, decision, etc.?

3. Connective Tissue

Everything is connected. Pull the thread!

  • How does this plan/ strategy/ decision/ deliverable connect to other plans/ strategies/ decisions/ deliverables?
  • Do we think what we’re doing solves or amplifies what’s already happened or what’s happening now?
  • Or, how does it lay the groundwork for what hasn’t happened yet but is part of the vision for the future? Using anticipatory thinking, what will be the ripple effect of this decision?

4. Cost

  • What will it cost us to do this in terms of money, time, bandwidth/energy, focus, priority shifts, etc.?
  • Is this cost tolerable? Expected? Agreed upon? Controversial? Communicated?
  • Does everyone involved understand the cost AND how we’re going to deal with the money, time, and energy spend?

5. Consequence

  • Are there consequences of not doing this, and if so, what are they?
  • What’s at stake?
  • What are the consequences of getting it wrong?
  • Are there any unintended consequences that we can anticipate or problem-solve now? (This is a ‘pre-mortem‘. Listen here for an example)

Added in: 6. Check Back and In

  • Let’s play back what we’ve discussed. What’s your understanding?
  • What else?
  • When are we circling back to check in?

 

Example In Action: Delegation

Below is an example in action for an Early Childhood Education Director delegation:

Vague Delegation: “Hey Alex, our family onboarding process is a mess. Parents are confused before their child’s first day. Can you overhaul the orientation process and create a new welcome kit for new families? Thanks!”

The Paint Done Delegation (Using the 5 Cs): Instead of a quick hand-off, the Director sits down with Alex and uses the 5Cs to paint done:

1. Context (Why)

Director: “Alex, over the last six months, our exit surveys show that 15% of families who left in the first 90 days felt ‘overwhelmed and disconnected’ between signing their enrolment papers and their child’s actual start date. We are losing families because our onboarding feels like cold paperwork rather than a warm welcome. We need to fix this gap.”

2. Colour (What it looks like)

Director: “For this to be ‘done,’ I need a completed Family Onboarding Kit that consists of three specific pieces:

  • A physical Welcome Booklet: A 4-page, visually clean booklet using our centre’s brand colours. It must include a ‘What to Pack’ checklist, a staff directory with photos, and answers to the top 5 questions new parents ask.
  • A Digital Email Sequence: A draft of 3 automated emails sent via our childcare management software at day -14, day -7, and day -1 before the child starts.
  • A Staff Cheat-Sheet: A 1-page guide for classroom educators detailing exactly how to prepare the child’s cubby and welcome the parents on morning number one.

When it’s done, it should look professional, feel deeply reassuring to an anxious parent, and be easy for our educators to execute.“

3. Connective Tissue (How it fits into the ecosystem)

Director: “This project connects directly to our Admin team, who handle the initial enrolment data, and our Room Leaders, who have to execute the first-day welcome. It also directly addresses Quality Area 6 of our National Quality Standards (Collaborative partnerships with families and communities). Your design needs to align with the admin workflow so they actually remember to hand the booklet out.”

4. Cost (Resources, time, and trade-offs)

Director: “In terms of financial cost, we have a budget of $600 for the graphic design and initial printing run. In terms of your time cost, I estimate this will take you about 10 hours over the next three weeks.

To make space for this, I am taking a trade-off: I am removing you from the scheduling roster for the rest of the month, and I will handle staff call-ins so you can have uninterrupted project time on Tuesday and Thursday mornings.”

5. Consequence (Impact of success or failure)

Director: “If we get this right, the consequence is that we increase family retention, stabilise our centre’s revenue, and significantly lower the drop-off anxiety for both the parents and our classroom teachers.

If we don’t do this or do a rushed job, we will continue to lose families to the new centre down the street, and our educators will keep bearing the brunt of frustrated, uninformed parents on Monday mornings.”

6. Check Back and In (Clarity and alignment)

To finish painting done, the Director checks back, asking Alex to repeat their understanding:

“Now that I’ve painted done, what does success look like to you in your own words? Where do you see the biggest roadblock? What are you seeing that I’m not?”

And establish when they’re next going to check in:

“Let’s do a 10-minute check-in next Wednesday. Does that work for you?’

 

Example in Action: Strategic Thinking

Here’s an example of how a Regional Health Leader could use the framework to open up a strategic dialogue about a Telehealth/Remote Patient Monitoring (RPM) initiative:

1. Context (Setting the Stage & Asking for Reality Checks)

Convenor: “To ground our conversation today, our regional data shows an 18% spike in non-urgent rural ED visits over the last year. Our data points to a lack of after-hours primary care as the main driver, leading to severe nursing burnout and ambulance diversions.

  • The Invitation: Before we look at solutions, I want to check the pulse. Does this 18% spike match what you are seeing on the ground in your specific facilities? What nuances or underlying factors is this data missing?“

2. Colour (Proposing a Vision & Inviting Co-Authoring)

Convenor: “If we look ahead to next year, a successful outcome, our ‘painted done’, might look like a fully integrated regional Telehealth and RPM framework. In my mind, a successful framework includes a phased rollout starting with our highest-volume clinics, a standardised clinical governance model for triaging, and a clear set of vendor requirements for an RFP.

  • The Invitation: I want to hold this picture loosely. When you imagine a successful, seamless telehealth model operating across our entire region, what does it look like from your seat? What needs to be added, modified, or completely removed from this picture for it to be viable for your teams?“

3. Connective Tissue (Mapping Systemic Links & Inviting Blind-Spot Spotting)

Convenor: “From a systems perspective, this strategy obviously connects deeply to our current EHR upgrade project. It also links our legal teams regarding cross-facility physician credentialing, and our admin workflows for patient intake.

  • The Invitation: Systems are messy, and changes here will ripple everywhere. Where are the hidden friction points? What other regional initiatives, committees, or operational workflows are we at risk of colliding with if we move forward with this?“

4. Cost (Analysing Resources & Proposing Honest Trade-offs)

Convenor: “To make this happen, we have a preliminary capital expenditure ceiling of $1.2 million, reallocated from the paused outpatient clinic expansion. We also have to acknowledge the human cost: designing this will take significant leadership bandwidth over the next six weeks.

  • The Invitation: Let’s get gritty about resources. Is that financial ceiling realistic based on your experience with digital health rollouts? And more importantly, if we ask our teams to prioritise designing this framework, what are we willing to put on the back burner to protect their time and wellbeing?“

5. Consequence (Aligning on Stakes & Assessing Risk)

Convenor: “The stakes are high. If we get this right, we can significantly reduce rural ED wait times, stabilise our workforce, and improve patient care. If we patch together a weak strategy, we risk severe financial penalties for ED overcrowding, deeper staff burnout, and worsening patient outcomes.

  • The Invitation: I’d like us to do a quick pre-mortem. If this initiative were to fail spectacularly six months from now, what would be the most likely cause? Conversely, what is the single greatest positive impact you think this could have on your specific hospital’s culture?“

6. Check Back and In (Transitioning to the Rumble)

Convenor: “Thank you for exploring this together. We have a heavy lift ahead, and I need your pressure-testing, your critical insights, and your expertise to get this right.

  • The Invitation: The floor is open. Based on your understanding, where do we need to start rumbling first?”
  • The Close-Out: Let’s keep the communication going and check in next month after the board meeting. Does Friday the 5th at 11am work?”

 

Example in Action: Decision Making

Here’s an example of using the framework to help guide a CEO, COO, CTO and CMO to make a decision about which sales platform to migrate to in the next financial year.

1. Context (Aligning on the Strategic Urgency)

The Goal: Establish why this migration is necessary right now, rather than sticking with the status quo.

  • Convenor: “Our current sales platform is a legacy system. We are missing our pipeline velocity targets by 14%, data is siloed, and our sales reps spend 30% of their day on manual data entry instead of selling. If we don’t migrate for the next financial year, we cannot scale our outbound strategy.”

  • Inviting the C-Suite Perspectives:

    • CEO Lens: Does this migration align with our broader market expansion goals for next year, or is it just a tactical fix?

    • CMO Lens: How severely is our current platform throttling our ability to track end-to-end customer acquisition and marketing ROI right now?

2. Colour (Defining What a “Winning” Platform Looks Like)

The Goal: Co-create the exact criteria the new platform must meet to be considered a success. We are ‘painting done’ on the ideal solution.

  • Convenor: “A successful platform for us means a tool that offers real-time pipeline visibility, native automation, an intuitive UI to ensure high adoption, and robust enterprise-grade security.”

  • Inviting the C-Suite Perspectives:

    • CTO Lens: Let’s get specific. What does ‘enterprise-grade’ mean to you for this migration? Does it mean SOC2 compliance, specific API limitations, or uptime SLA guarantees?

    • COO Lens: What does ‘high adoption’ look like for operations? Are we looking for a platform with out-of-the-box templates, or do we need a system that allows us to heavily customize our specific pipeline stages?

    • CMO Lens: What are the non-negotiable data-capture fields marketing needs from sales at the top of the funnel to make this a win?

3. Connective Tissue (Mapping Systemic Dependencies)

The Goal: Surface how this decision ripples across the rest of the organisation’s tech, workflows, and culture.

  • Convenor: “A sales platform doesn’t live in a silo. It sits right in the middle of our corporate ecosystem.”

  • Inviting the C-Suite Perspectives:

    • CTO & CMO Collaboration: How does this platform connect to our current marketing automation stack and Customer Data Platform (CDP)? Are we looking for a native integration, or are we comfortable building and maintaining custom webhooks?

    • COO Lens: How will this change affect our customer success and finance teams? When a deal closes in the new platform, how does it trigger onboarding workflows and hand off data to our ERP/billing system?

4. Cost (Analysing the Total Price Tag & Trade-Offs)

The Goal: Look beyond the software licensing fee to evaluate the human, operational, and time costs.

  • Convenor: “Beyond just making a decision on a software budget; we’re also deciding on where to allocate our focus, time and energy.”

  • Inviting the C-Suite Perspectives:

    • CEO & CTO Lens: Beyond the upfront implementation fees, what is the technical debt cost? What internal engineering resources will the CTO have to reallocate to manage this migration, and what product roadmap features will get delayed as a result?

    • COO & CMO Lens: What is the operational cost of the ‘dip’ and the inevitable drop in sales productivity during Q1 while the team is being retrained? What is our tolerance level for that dip, and how do we mitigate it?

5. Consequence (Weighing the Risks of the Decision)

The Goal: Run a ‘pre-mortem’ to align on the risks of choosing wrong versus the reward of choosing right.

  • Convenor: “Let’s look at the stakes of this final decision.”

  • Inviting the C-Suite Perspectives:

    • To the Whole Room: If we make this decision today, sign the contract, and find ourselves failing spectacularly six months from now, what went wrong? Did the tech fail (CTO), did the reps refuse to use it (COO), did the lead attribution break (CMO), or did we overspend (CEO)?

    • The Upside Check: Conversely, if this migration goes perfectly, what is the single biggest operational lever this unlocks for us by Q3?

6. Check Back and In (Moving to the Decision  and The Rumble Closing)

Once all four executives have spoken to the 5 Cs, the Convenor can synthesise the notes and call for the final alignment:

  • Convenor: “We have mapped out the context, defined what a winning platform looks like, identified the integration bottlenecks, counted the true operational costs, and stared the risks in the face.
  • Inviting the C-Suite Perspectives:
    • To the Whole Room: Based on this, platform option [A] optimises for the CTO’s integration needs but has a higher cost. Option [B] optimises for the CMO’s data needs but has a steeper learning curve for the COO’s team. Let’s make our final choice: which trade-off are we collectively willing to own?”
    • What do we understand are the next steps?
    • When are we going to check back in to keep aligned?