It's basically impossible for a single person, or even a team of 10 people, to oversee every little aspect of a large organization. Can you imagine the CEO of GM overseeing every little aspect of vehicle production from the glass being tempered, to the nuts and bolts being machined, to the finance department, to the design and engineering department.
Yes I agree. This is why the Toyota records re: Deming-inspired bottom-up reporting systems; anonymized drop boxes for suggestions; five minute sessions at the beginning of workdays where everyone is encouraged to speak up etc. are so interesting to me. The culture had to be 'manually' democratized in Japan, because the population were literally coming out of a feudal system, where overlords, with the emperor at the top, were like Gods. It was the ultimate expression of the existence of rigid hierarchy. The little people at the bottom had no choice but to follow all orders, without input - and that had implications on safety, quality etc.
What was discovered was that the man-on-the-ground; or the bureaucrat-on-the-street; man-on-the-coalface; man-in-the-trench type person knows a few things. If they say that the machine will be better if the blade is set at such and such angle, then you give them the discretion to change it. As a CE, this means one cannot arbitrarily demand to interfere in daily operations, which gives birth to a whole genre of strategy literature.
What's also interesting, is the current effect of coming online. As businesses necessarily adopt cloud-based software and plug all their employees in, there is an incredible pancaking of that previous hierarchy. And in my opinion, CEs suddenly find themselves at a loss. Some will even display narcissism, as they thrash to remain relevant. Everything is automated - they might be able to suggest another app, or bot or something to be made, but the system is far bigger and way more flattened than they expected.
Moreover, each of what were previously minions, now have networks of contacts. And in this game, the more contacts you have that are actively engaged, the 'more important' you are considered in the pancake landscape. The CE is just another one of those participants. Suddenly they are playing a social media game. I guess Musk, and Trump are prime examples of such CEs.
Yes I agree. This is why the Toyota records re: Deming-inspired bottom-up reporting systems; anonymized drop boxes for suggestions; five minute sessions at the beginning of workdays where everyone is encouraged to speak up etc. are so interesting to me. The culture had to be 'manually' democratized in Japan, because the population were literally coming out of a feudal system, where overlords, with the emperor at the top, were like Gods. It was the ultimate expression of the existence of rigid hierarchy. The little people at the bottom had no choice but to follow all orders, without input - and that had implications on safety, quality etc.
What was discovered was that the man-on-the-ground; or the bureaucrat-on-the-street; man-on-the-coalface; man-in-the-trench type person knows a few things. If they say that the machine will be better if the blade is set at such and such angle, then you give them the discretion to change it. As a CE, this means one cannot arbitrarily demand to interfere in daily operations, which gives birth to a whole genre of strategy literature.
What's also interesting, is the current effect of coming online. As businesses necessarily adopt cloud-based software and plug all their employees in, there is an incredible pancaking of that previous hierarchy. And in my opinion, CEs suddenly find themselves at a loss. Some will even display narcissism, as they thrash to remain relevant. Everything is automated - they might be able to suggest another app, or bot or something to be made, but the system is far bigger and way more flattened than they expected.
Moreover, each of what were previously minions, now have networks of contacts. And in this game, the more contacts you have that are actively engaged, the 'more important' you are considered in the pancake landscape. The CE is just another one of those participants. Suddenly they are playing a social media game. I guess Musk, and Trump are prime examples of such CEs.