Seth Godin : Management and leadership, Ray Kroc and Henry Ford were pioneers of management. Frederick Taylor had a stopwatch and we got the phrase “human resources” from the idea of treating people like a machine. And if you’ve ever heard the phrase, “Being jerked around,” or calling someone a jerk, it comes from the Henry Ford Model T plant, because you would the workers and they would be dancing around like marionettes because there was someone like a stopwatch on every single motion. This is management. And management is super effective at a fast food restaurant or any process that you need people to act like a machine. If you don’t do it, no one’s going to show up for their shift and your productivity may go down. Leadership says, “I don’t know the right way, but I might be able to build a community of people in a place where they find the right way.”
Distributed leadership from the Book Extreme Ownership: Leaders must delegate authority to subordinate leaders. No one person can effectively manage every detail, especially in fast-moving situations. Subordinate leaders need to understand the mission’s overall objectives so they can make decisions independently within their areas of responsibility. This allows the team to be more flexible and adaptive while maintaining alignment with the broader mission.
It would be nice if I could explain exactly how someone needs to do their job. I can’t, though. There are too many variables. So I have to be a leader, develop my team members, explain the goals, and let them solve the problems themselves. I will not have all the answers.