Impactful Element: Management
Impactful "Management": strategic orchestration of resources for optimal goal achievement.
Welcome to The Impactful Executive!
Read time: 2.5 min
The Impactful Executive newsletter uses the Impactful Framework as a loosely structured sequence of nine elements, each with evidence-based practices and tactics for executives, managers, advisors, and their teams.
See the reference article below, if needed, before this Element deep dive.
The Impactful Framework
Evidence-based practices for executive teams.
“Strategy without tactics is the slowest route to victory. Tactics without strategy are the noise before defeat.”
Sun Tzu
Impactful Element Defined: Management
“The function of management is to produce more managers, not more followers."
Peter Drucker
"Management is about arranging and telling. Leadership is about nurturing and enhancing."
Tom Peters
The “Management” element is defined as:
At its core, management is the process of guiding a company towards its objectives by efficiently and effectively using available resources.
It involves clear goal-setting and strategic planning, outlining organizational structures that clarify roles and responsibilities, and allocating resources judiciously.
Management further requires rapid decision-making in uncertain times, ethical leadership, and managing crises effectively.
It incorporates systems of rewards and consequences and facilitates clear and effective communication throughout the organization.
In essence, management is a function that ensures the wheels of the organization keep turning smoothly towards their desired destination.
"Management by objective works - if you know the objectives. Ninety percent of the time you don't."
Peter Drucker
"Effective management always means asking the right question."
Robert Heller
Impactful Element Practices: Management
The following is a sample selection of Impactful Management Practices:
Focus on Outcome-Oriented Performance Management: Giving outcomes precedence over activities can significantly improve performance and investment return. Netflix's 'Keeper Test' is an example of this, in which managers are urged to keep only high-value team members based on the outcomes they achieve, so establishing a high-performance atmosphere where outcomes are critical.
Ensure Effective Resource Allocation: Allocating resources appropriately for optimal efficiency can considerably boost productivity. Take, for example, Southwest Airlines, which only uses the Boeing 737, reducing maintenance and training expenses while maintaining speedy turnaround times.
Delegate Tasks and Responsibilities: By allowing team members to use their skills fully, effective delegation can improve team performance. When Ray Kroc took over McDonald's, he entrusted day-to-day operations to franchise owners, emphasizing standardization to ensure a consistent customer experience.
Set Specific, SMART Goals: Communication of expectations and goal-setting clarity offer direction, and motivation, and can increase employee productivity. Jeff Bezos' yearly shareholder letters emphasize this habit, in which he sets ambitious goals for the corporation. Similarly, the Toyota Production System specifies responsibilities and expectations clearly, ensuring all employees understand their part in achieving the company's goals.
Use Participatory, Decentralized Decision-Making: Decentralized decision-making can improve productivity and employee motivation, while including employees in decision-making can increase job satisfaction, productivity, and innovation. Zappos is a good example of how authority and decision-making are spread across self-organizing teams.
Practice Strategic Planning: Making time for strategic and deep thinking will help you make better and more productive decisions. Alibaba uses this strategy to balance long-term goals and short-term activities by setting strategic objectives in multiple time increments. The 'Think Weeks' of Bill Gates demonstrate how this technique led to key strategic choices for Microsoft.
Decisive Leadership: Decisive leadership can improve team performance and overall productivity. For example, Apple CEO Tim Cook streamlined operations, decreased inventory, and assured timely product introductions by making swift, decisive decisions.
“Management is doing things right; leadership is doing the right things.”
Peter Drucker
In subsequent newsletters, we will deep-dive into many specific practices outlined above.
The Impactful Executive’s Purpose
Reminder: this newsletter pursues high-impact practices and tactics across each element to share fact-based, usable, and (hopefully) surprising insights.
It takes deliberate and sustained effort to drive organizational greatness. The Impactful Executive aims to make this greatness far more reachable.
In Jim Collins’ words, "Greatness is not a function of circumstance. Greatness, it turns out, is largely a matter of conscious choice and discipline."
Impactfully yours,
The Impactful Executive Team
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