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The point of being a boss isn't just to have power over others (although I'm sure some do enjoy that) but to get more stuff you want done by delegating it. Of c
by jhbadger 7y ago
The point of being a boss isn't just to have power over others (although I'm sure some do enjoy that) but to get more stuff you want done by delegating it. Of course a danger is eventually you don't get to do any of the stuff you want to do yourself because you are spending all your time supervising the people who are actually doing it.
- JumpCrisscross 7y ago> being a boss isn't just to have power over others (although I'm sure some do enjoy that) but to get more stuff you want done by delegating it The latter, getting others to act on your behalf, is pretty much the definition of power.
- icebraining 7y agoI think the distinction is between using power for some other purpose, or using it for its own sake.
- tlb 7y agoThe other way of looking at it: The point of being a boss is to help your people get more done by organizing them and coordinating their efforts.
- TeMPOraL 7y agoThat's the point of view where the thing being done is a free variable; "whatever it is they're doing, my job is to help them be better at it". It makes sense at the low-tier management level, but someone somewhere has to have a goal, or the whole enterprise is a colossal waste of time and resources. This kind of thinking infecting top-executive level is IMO one of the problems with a lot of big companies.
- hammock 7y agoI feel like parent comment deserves a closer read that you seem to have given it. They specifically mention organization and coordination (around a common goal).
- TeMPOraL 7y agoFair. I assumed they meant organization and coordination around whatever it is they do (i.e. goal as a free variable), but upon re-reading, I admit the parent might have meant "helping people achieve your goal", as opposed to "delegating stuff and then complaining that, because of all the supervising, you don't have time to do anything about your goal yourself".
- Barrin92 7y ago>but someone somewhere has to have a goal, or the whole enterprise is a colossal waste of time and resources. free economies overall perform very well without having anybody setting goals. In healthy environments productive activity can very well be emergent without any sort of dictat. In fact long plans and visions at big companies are often exactly what makes them slow, they operate like old tankers that set course on some pre-planned direction and aren't flexible enough to switch course simply because they organise decisions top-down.
- tbrownaw 7y agofree economies overall perform very well without having anybody setting goals. In healthy environments productive activity can very well be emergent without any sort of dictat My understanding is that internal corporate stuff tends to not be subject to the same market forces that are what make free economies work well.
- TeMPOraL 7y agoTop-down decisionmaking is actually efficient, big companies are slow in spite of, not because of it. The slowness comes partly from bureaucracy, but partly arises because big companies have something to lose. The rapid reaction of small companies only looks like movement on the macroscale. In reality, it's a series of births and deaths. They don't move much at all, but they die fast and get formed even faster compared to big ones. And that forming part usually involves individuals with goals.
- protonfish 7y agoIn a healthy organization, that is the point. In corrupt organizations (in my experience the vast majority of organizations) the point is rising through the social hierarchy. Having more people underneath you is a status symbol so you collect them even if there is nothing for them to do for you.