The Argument for Micromanaging
Is it crazy for CEOs to delegate important decisions to direct reports instead of digging in themselves? What would Steve Jobs do?
Good Morning!
Here are today’s highlights:
A columnist asserts that there are big benefits to be had from connecting new hires with existing customers.
Another columnist argues that new regulations can create big opportunities.
Can “retailtainment”—think Nerf blasters—save shopping malls?
Your in-flight Wi-Fi is about to get much better.
MANAGEMENT
The big conversation in Silicon Valley right now is over whether micromanaging is actually a good thing: “On Sunday, Paul Graham, a writer and founding partner of the startup accelerator Y Combinator, published a 1,050-word essay that took tech and business communities by storm. He asked: Why are startup founders directed to run their large companies like managers, delegating to their direct reports, rather than getting involved as they did in earlier stages of their companies? Graham argued that operating in ‘manager mode’ over ‘founder mode’ is anathema to companies.”
“Graham credited Brian Chesky, Airbnb's co-founder and CEO, with sparking the idea and most of the arguments in the blog. At a recent Y Combinator event, Chesky argued that conventional advice on building and scaling up a startup is broken.”
“He said, as he has before, that investors and outside managers just don't have the insights that founders do. He said that splitting a company into organizational tiers — isolating founders from anyone but their direct reports — often kills the business.”
“Chesky's talk hit another nerve with the founders in the room and then with Graham's readers. The Airbnb exec said founders were constantly being ‘gaslit’ — first by outside voices asking them to run the company as managers, and then by employees who don't like the manager's way.” READ MORE
