A wheel for the next project lead

We were stuck on who should lead the next sprint. The calendar was a mess of vacations and deadlines, and I’d been quietly checking schedules, trying to find a fair gap. You could feel the hesitation in the air, that familiar tension before someone has to volunteer or be volunteered.

The moment we stopped trying to decide

Someone joked about drawing straws, and it wasn’t a bad idea. It wasn’t about avoiding responsibility, but about removing the weight of the choice itself. We all knew the work would get done, but the decision of who went first had become this unnecessary knot.I pulled up a simple spinner tool. There was a pause, a collective shrug that felt more like relief than indecision. We just needed a nudge, something to break the silent calculus everyone was running in their heads.

What the wheel held

We didn’t put tasks on it. We put our names. It felt different that way—less about assigning a chore and more about acknowledging that any of us could handle it. The click to spin was almost ceremonial.When it landed, there was a soft laugh. The chosen person gave a nod, not of burden, but of ‘okay, my turn.’ The conversation immediately shifted to the project details, the energy lighter. The decision was made, and we could all move on.

It wasn't about randomness

It was about fairness when being fair felt complicated. We all had full plates, and this acknowledged that without having to debate it.

A shared exhale

The real win was the shift in the room. The subtle competition to seem neither too eager nor too reluctant just dissolved.