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Why Managers Matter: The Perils of the Bossless Company
A manifesto on managers and hierarchy that bucks the trend of the lean, flat, leaderless organization
As business struggles to adapt to a rapidly changing world, managers are bombarded with a bewildering array of schemes for how to be a boss and make an organization tick. It’s tempting to be seduced by futurist fantasies where every company has the culture of a startup, and where employees in wacky, whimsical office settings, liberated from hierarchies and bosses that oppress them, are the foundation for breakthrough performance.
“Get real,” warn Nicolai J. Foss and Peter G. Klein. These fads ironically lead to micromanaging and, often, to disaster. Companies and societies, they show, need authority and hierarchy to coordinate work, including creative work. And, counterintuitively, Foss and Klein illustrate how the creative use of authority and hierarchy helps companies to be more agile and flexible, enabling educated, motivated people and teams to thrive.
And not a moment too soon: Foss and Klein provide evidence that global challenges such as the proliferation of artificial intelligence, economic disruption, empowered knowledge workers, and black swan events such as the pandemic actually make hierarchy and the job of the manager more important than ever.
As business struggles to adapt to a rapidly changing world, managers are bombarded with a bewildering array of schemes for how to be a boss and make an organization tick. It’s tempting to be seduced by futurist fantasies where every company has the culture of a startup, and where employees in wacky, whimsical office settings, liberated from hierarchies and bosses that oppress them, are the foundation for breakthrough performance.
“Get real,” warn Nicolai J. Foss and Peter G. Klein. These fads ironically lead to micromanaging and, often, to disaster. Companies and societies, they show, need authority and hierarchy to coordinate work, including creative work. And, counterintuitively, Foss and Klein illustrate how the creative use of authority and hierarchy helps companies to be more agile and flexible, enabling educated, motivated people and teams to thrive.
And not a moment too soon: Foss and Klein provide evidence that global challenges such as the proliferation of artificial intelligence, economic disruption, empowered knowledge workers, and black swan events such as the pandemic actually make hierarchy and the job of the manager more important than ever.
320 pages, Hardcover
Published October 4, 2022
18 people are currently reading
1264 people want to read
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December 29, 2022
No es con mucha frecuencia que uno lee un libro que lo hace cambiar de opinión. Este es uno de ellos.
A medida que avanza la digitalización de todos los aspectos de los negocios se podría pensar que ésta implicaría un inexorable aplanamiento de las estructuras corporativas, con una cada vez mayor capacidad de los equipos de actuar de manera autónoma al tener acceso a una mayor cantidad de información y con capacidad de innovar a una mayor velocidad en comparación con las empresas tradicionales, jerárquicas y burocráticas.
Sin embargo, los autores de este interesante libro nos hacen ver que esto no es necesariamente así. Precisamente en estos tiempos, en los que es fundamental ser innovadores y ajustarse rápido a las cambiantes circunstancias del mercado y de las nuevas tecnologías, que los directores de empresa son más necesarios que nunca. En en libro se exploran dos temas fundamentales: en primer lugar, se desmiente la noción de que en las empresas más exitosas de la época digital casi no hay jefes, ni dirección "desde arriba" sino solo equipos independientes, auto-gestionados y ágiles; por otro lado, se describen los peligros de una completa descentralización de funciones y se establecen parámetros para lograr el equilibrio entre la descentralización, el empoderamiento de los colaboradores y el control y determinación de la estrategia de parte de los directores, dependiendo del mercado en el que opera la empresa y las tareas que lleva a cabo para satisfacer a sus clientes.
Libro muy recomendable para todos los directores de empresa que enfrentan los retos de la digitalización y están en proceso de definir la mejor estructura organizacional en sus empresas para lograr los beneficios de la economía digital.
A medida que avanza la digitalización de todos los aspectos de los negocios se podría pensar que ésta implicaría un inexorable aplanamiento de las estructuras corporativas, con una cada vez mayor capacidad de los equipos de actuar de manera autónoma al tener acceso a una mayor cantidad de información y con capacidad de innovar a una mayor velocidad en comparación con las empresas tradicionales, jerárquicas y burocráticas.
Sin embargo, los autores de este interesante libro nos hacen ver que esto no es necesariamente así. Precisamente en estos tiempos, en los que es fundamental ser innovadores y ajustarse rápido a las cambiantes circunstancias del mercado y de las nuevas tecnologías, que los directores de empresa son más necesarios que nunca. En en libro se exploran dos temas fundamentales: en primer lugar, se desmiente la noción de que en las empresas más exitosas de la época digital casi no hay jefes, ni dirección "desde arriba" sino solo equipos independientes, auto-gestionados y ágiles; por otro lado, se describen los peligros de una completa descentralización de funciones y se establecen parámetros para lograr el equilibrio entre la descentralización, el empoderamiento de los colaboradores y el control y determinación de la estrategia de parte de los directores, dependiendo del mercado en el que opera la empresa y las tareas que lleva a cabo para satisfacer a sus clientes.
Libro muy recomendable para todos los directores de empresa que enfrentan los retos de la digitalización y están en proceso de definir la mejor estructura organizacional en sus empresas para lograr los beneficios de la economía digital.
January 17, 2023
**SAY YES TO MANAGERS **
Discover the benefits and drawbacks of both hierarchical and bossless company organizations.
How is your workplace structured? Is there a clear hierarchy, with employees and bosses, and orders handed out from higher-ups? Or does every employee have a sense of autonomy, free to make the rules as they work?
Whether your workplace is one or the other, how well do you think that current structure is working?
Chances are your company has fluctuated – or will at some point – between different styles of internal organization. Often, these changes come as a response to the company’s growth – or its failures.
Recently, the idea of a bossless company has exploded in popularity. Supporters of the idea advocate for a company without managers or leaders. Instead, the employees are autonomous and empowered, work cooperatively together, and hold no authority over anyone but themselves.
In their book Why Managers Matter, Nicolai J. Foss and Peter G. Klein explore the popularity of a flat, bossless company structure. They show that the real-life examples touted by supporters of the idea aren’t actually as flat and leaderless as they seem. Nor, as it happens, is hierarchy as terrible as it’s made out to be.
In this book, we’ll look at what hierarchy actually is, explore the idea of a bossless company, and compare some of the benefits and drawbacks of each type of organization.
Ultimately, we’ll see why neither hierarchy nor bosslessness is the perfect organizational solution and why that’s no reason to despair. There are many examples of how finding the right balance of organizational qualities can help companies excel and we’ll explore a few later in this book. But first, let’s start with what actually defines hierarchy.
---
What does it mean to have a hierarchical or bossless structure?
When you think of hierarchy, what do you picture? Feudal overlords making life miserable for peasants? Overpaid CEOs? Layers of middle management that slow down all communications in a company?
These are examples of hierarchy, to be sure. But they’re extreme examples of ineffective implementation of hierarchy.
According to Foss and Klein, hierarchy is a response to the difficulties of building a complex organization that involves many people. Hierarchy is needed to effectively manage relationships and cooperation among workers and to keep people’s varied motives and interests aligned.
Hierarchy isn’t as simple as giving certain people command and control over others. Although it is giving power over others to some people, the purpose and extent of that power must be carefully defined.
Hierarchy establishes procedures and policies. It gives people a blueprint for managing the complexities of working together and solving problems or disputes. A satisfactorily arranged hierarchy involves not just power distribution but also provides structural support for a company’s operations.
So if that’s what a standard hierarchy model looks like, then what are the key aspects of a bossless company? This organizational style is also known as a flat structure or a leaderless company. Taking away layers of management within a company is known as decentralizing, and it’s a key aspect of a flat organizational structure.
At its most basic, this structure sets every employee equal to every other employee. Decisions are made using consensus or a vote. No one has any authority over anyone but themselves, and everyone works together equally to both set and achieve the company’s goals.
At its most extreme, a flat organization might not even have any job titles or specific responsibilities attached to any one person. Everyone is equally responsible for completing tasks as they see fit in order to achieve the company’s goals, which would, theoretically, also be set by everyone in agreement with everyone else.
Proponents of the bossless structure argue the bad outweighs the good when considering hierarchy’s effects. But is that really true? In the next section, we’ll explore the benefits and drawbacks of a hierarchical business structure.
---
Benefits and drawbacks of hierarchy.
If you were to rate hierarchy on a scale of good to bad, how would you personally rate it?
For many people, the answer falls toward the negative side of the scale. And it’s no wonder! Hierarchy often comes with a lot of negative connotations – consider the stereotypes of a micromanaging boss, out-of-touch higher-ups who demand the impossible of their employees, and so on. But if this were all hierarchy had to offer, it wouldn’t so naturally crop up in human societies.
Many of the benefits of hierarchy stem from its very definition. An effective hierarchy allows people to accomplish complex tasks and achieve goals that involve many people completing both independent and dependent activities. A hierarchical organization benefits from time saved by following established procedures and by not having to discuss procedure options nor reach a consensus with every single worker each time a new task is initiated.
The drawbacks to hierarchy generally come from improper implementation: something like having too rigid a structure in place or allowing higher-ups to micromanage employees.
With too rigid a structure, workers can feel constrained and listless. Their sense of creativity is stifled. They might feel no sense of purpose in their jobs because they feel anyone could be doing them. Their personal talents begin to seem unnecessary and unappreciated if everyone follows exact steps and never has a chance to solve a problem on their own.
With micromanagement, similar feelings can arise in workers. Think about it – what if you didn’t have to follow an exact procedure to get your work done, but your boss constantly peered over your shoulder, gave suggestions, and outright changed what you’d done?
How would you feel after a few weeks of this?
Probably pretty constrained, maybe even resentful. And who could blame you?
Hopefully, you’ve never experienced this situation. But if you have, you should know that it’s the result of an improper implementation of hierarchy, not an inherent quality of hierarchy itself.
---
Benefits and drawbacks of a leaderless organization.
If you haven’t personally experienced the frustration and resentment a bad boss can cause, you’re one of the lucky ones. But you’ve probably at least heard of someone else’s bad boss, right? If managers are so often ineffective – or worse, outright hindrances – why not do away with them altogether?
This is much of the motivation behind the push for a flat, bossless structure.
One of the biggest benefits of a flat company, according to those in favor of the structure, is its efficiency. Cutting out middle managers means fewer layers of people to go through when a big decision needs to be made. Employees are empowered to make decisions on their own and do what they see as best. Many supporters of the flat structure claim employees would feel happy, motivated, and powerful without layers of bosses above them.
This claim is difficult to prove or disprove, because, according to Foss and Klein, there are no true examples of purely flat organizations to study.
In practice, supposedly leaderless companies often prove to have some kind of leadership within, such as a thin layer of executives who then deal directly with employees instead of managers. This can lead to one of the drawbacks of a somewhat decentralized company – micromanagement.
But wait, isn’t that exactly what this system is supposed to prevent?
Well yes, one of the very things flat companies are supposed to do away with can actually become exacerbated when businesses reorganize into a flatter structure. With fewer layers of middle management, executives are closer to the everyday goings-on of the employees.
A 14-year study of Fortune 500 companies showed that when companies de-layer by removing middle management layers, not only do the companies tend to hire more people at the executive level, but those executives tend to intervene even more often with everyday procedures than when more layers exist in the company.
Have you heard of Valve? It’s often referenced when people speak or write about leaderless companies. Upon further examination though, Valve proves to have a sort of ruling class within it – some ex-employees of the company have described the work culture as being similar to high school, with popular kids who have informal yet powerful influence over the workings of the company.
This dearth of truly bossless companies is because, as humans, we naturally tend to fill vacuums of power with some sort of hierarchical structure, whether formal or informal. So perhaps another drawback of the flat organizational structure is the difficulty we humans have in sticking to it.
---
Finding a balance.
So we’ve covered the qualities of both hierarchical and leaderless companies. But, as with many things in our world, there’s not a true dichotomy here. Most companies exist somewhere along the spectrum of a hierarchical to leaderless structure. The trick is finding the right balance for each company.
According to Foss and Klein, no business can truly exist without some kind of hierarchy. As we saw in the last section, Valve is often touted as an example of a leaderless company but still has an informal ruling class.
Another example of a mostly flat company is the widely known Wikipedia. The online encyclopedia is often cited as a successful, crowd-sourced, bossless endeavor. But much of its success is only possible with the support of hierarchical features.
A 2016 study by Indiana University found that most of Wikipedia’s procedures and norms were first implemented by a small group of users at the beginning of the endeavor. As the network grew, those norms largely stayed the same, guiding the course and style of the project.
Additionally, Wikipedia has multiple layers of background roles and rules involved in the production and upkeep of its pages. So even this well-known example of a supposedly flat company turns out to be a balance of both hierarchy and decentralization. Its balancing point is closer to the decentralization side of the spectrum, but the fact is that it’s a careful balance.
So how can a company decide on the right organizational structure? Well, there are a few key aspects about itself a company must evaluate to find a good mix of both hierarchy and employee empowerment.
The first, and perhaps most difficult, decision to make is about decision-making itself. Who should have the authority to make which decisions? Whoever is involved in deciding a company’s organizational structure must figure out which tasks and decisions to keep for themselves, and which ones to delegate to other people within the company. Often, managers are employed specifically to manage this delegation.
Consider a company that has more than a handful of employees or has multiple teams with a lot of coordination required to accomplish overarching goals. For this kind of company, it would probably be beneficial to create at least one role dedicated to managing that coordination and task delegation.
Once that’s decided, you then need to figure out how many employees or teams necessitate designating a manager. Unfortunately, there’s no one true answer to this. The specific company and circumstances within which it works determine when a distinct manager might be needed. Let’s look at an example of this dilemma.
Have you ever considered what it takes to grow, harvest, and distribute tomatoes? Well, Chris Rufer, the founder and sole owner of Morning Star, has. Rufer founded Morning Star in 1970. This food processing company focuses on tomatoes and operates on a near-bossless model. The secret? Contracts.
Morning Star employees work by creating contract upon contract among themselves. These mini-contracts function much like job descriptions but with a lot more specificity. The contracts allow workers to clearly define expectations and to make decisions about how to operate without the input of anyone beyond those affected by the contract. This method works extremely well for the company’s 600 main employees – with additional seasonal workers joining during harvesting.
Okay, that may be well and good for tomatoes, but what about a bigger, more complex company? What organizational structure might work best for a company comprised of many interdependent teams working on varied projects and timelines? For this, let’s consider another fruit, Apple. But this Apple is the one with a capital A – the tech company, not the fruit.
When Steve Jobs stepped away from the company, it struggled. Upon his return, he cut many projects and went against popular opinion to redirect efforts. His top-down decision-making is lauded as the reason for Apple’s turnaround and ultimate astounding successes. Without the quick implementation and unified vision behind Job’s decisions, the company might well have foundered.
Which brings us back to our original question: What balance of organizational structure is best for a company? Well, the answer is that it truly depends on the goals, type of work, and environment of the business.
---
In the end, there’s no clear answer to whether a hierarchical or flat organizational structure is better. As we discovered, both structures have their benefits and drawbacks. Ultimately, neither a strictly hierarchical nor a fully bossless company is completely practical. The best balance of these styles can only be determined for each individual business on its own. Employees often don’t need input from their managers to accomplish day-to-day tasks and even some small-scale, unusual situations. But in times of upheaval and struggle – or with great growth in a company – the supportive structure of managers and top-down decision-making can be essential.
Discover the benefits and drawbacks of both hierarchical and bossless company organizations.
How is your workplace structured? Is there a clear hierarchy, with employees and bosses, and orders handed out from higher-ups? Or does every employee have a sense of autonomy, free to make the rules as they work?
Whether your workplace is one or the other, how well do you think that current structure is working?
Chances are your company has fluctuated – or will at some point – between different styles of internal organization. Often, these changes come as a response to the company’s growth – or its failures.
Recently, the idea of a bossless company has exploded in popularity. Supporters of the idea advocate for a company without managers or leaders. Instead, the employees are autonomous and empowered, work cooperatively together, and hold no authority over anyone but themselves.
In their book Why Managers Matter, Nicolai J. Foss and Peter G. Klein explore the popularity of a flat, bossless company structure. They show that the real-life examples touted by supporters of the idea aren’t actually as flat and leaderless as they seem. Nor, as it happens, is hierarchy as terrible as it’s made out to be.
In this book, we’ll look at what hierarchy actually is, explore the idea of a bossless company, and compare some of the benefits and drawbacks of each type of organization.
Ultimately, we’ll see why neither hierarchy nor bosslessness is the perfect organizational solution and why that’s no reason to despair. There are many examples of how finding the right balance of organizational qualities can help companies excel and we’ll explore a few later in this book. But first, let’s start with what actually defines hierarchy.
---
What does it mean to have a hierarchical or bossless structure?
When you think of hierarchy, what do you picture? Feudal overlords making life miserable for peasants? Overpaid CEOs? Layers of middle management that slow down all communications in a company?
These are examples of hierarchy, to be sure. But they’re extreme examples of ineffective implementation of hierarchy.
According to Foss and Klein, hierarchy is a response to the difficulties of building a complex organization that involves many people. Hierarchy is needed to effectively manage relationships and cooperation among workers and to keep people’s varied motives and interests aligned.
Hierarchy isn’t as simple as giving certain people command and control over others. Although it is giving power over others to some people, the purpose and extent of that power must be carefully defined.
Hierarchy establishes procedures and policies. It gives people a blueprint for managing the complexities of working together and solving problems or disputes. A satisfactorily arranged hierarchy involves not just power distribution but also provides structural support for a company’s operations.
So if that’s what a standard hierarchy model looks like, then what are the key aspects of a bossless company? This organizational style is also known as a flat structure or a leaderless company. Taking away layers of management within a company is known as decentralizing, and it’s a key aspect of a flat organizational structure.
At its most basic, this structure sets every employee equal to every other employee. Decisions are made using consensus or a vote. No one has any authority over anyone but themselves, and everyone works together equally to both set and achieve the company’s goals.
At its most extreme, a flat organization might not even have any job titles or specific responsibilities attached to any one person. Everyone is equally responsible for completing tasks as they see fit in order to achieve the company’s goals, which would, theoretically, also be set by everyone in agreement with everyone else.
Proponents of the bossless structure argue the bad outweighs the good when considering hierarchy’s effects. But is that really true? In the next section, we’ll explore the benefits and drawbacks of a hierarchical business structure.
---
Benefits and drawbacks of hierarchy.
If you were to rate hierarchy on a scale of good to bad, how would you personally rate it?
For many people, the answer falls toward the negative side of the scale. And it’s no wonder! Hierarchy often comes with a lot of negative connotations – consider the stereotypes of a micromanaging boss, out-of-touch higher-ups who demand the impossible of their employees, and so on. But if this were all hierarchy had to offer, it wouldn’t so naturally crop up in human societies.
Many of the benefits of hierarchy stem from its very definition. An effective hierarchy allows people to accomplish complex tasks and achieve goals that involve many people completing both independent and dependent activities. A hierarchical organization benefits from time saved by following established procedures and by not having to discuss procedure options nor reach a consensus with every single worker each time a new task is initiated.
The drawbacks to hierarchy generally come from improper implementation: something like having too rigid a structure in place or allowing higher-ups to micromanage employees.
With too rigid a structure, workers can feel constrained and listless. Their sense of creativity is stifled. They might feel no sense of purpose in their jobs because they feel anyone could be doing them. Their personal talents begin to seem unnecessary and unappreciated if everyone follows exact steps and never has a chance to solve a problem on their own.
With micromanagement, similar feelings can arise in workers. Think about it – what if you didn’t have to follow an exact procedure to get your work done, but your boss constantly peered over your shoulder, gave suggestions, and outright changed what you’d done?
How would you feel after a few weeks of this?
Probably pretty constrained, maybe even resentful. And who could blame you?
Hopefully, you’ve never experienced this situation. But if you have, you should know that it’s the result of an improper implementation of hierarchy, not an inherent quality of hierarchy itself.
---
Benefits and drawbacks of a leaderless organization.
If you haven’t personally experienced the frustration and resentment a bad boss can cause, you’re one of the lucky ones. But you’ve probably at least heard of someone else’s bad boss, right? If managers are so often ineffective – or worse, outright hindrances – why not do away with them altogether?
This is much of the motivation behind the push for a flat, bossless structure.
One of the biggest benefits of a flat company, according to those in favor of the structure, is its efficiency. Cutting out middle managers means fewer layers of people to go through when a big decision needs to be made. Employees are empowered to make decisions on their own and do what they see as best. Many supporters of the flat structure claim employees would feel happy, motivated, and powerful without layers of bosses above them.
This claim is difficult to prove or disprove, because, according to Foss and Klein, there are no true examples of purely flat organizations to study.
In practice, supposedly leaderless companies often prove to have some kind of leadership within, such as a thin layer of executives who then deal directly with employees instead of managers. This can lead to one of the drawbacks of a somewhat decentralized company – micromanagement.
But wait, isn’t that exactly what this system is supposed to prevent?
Well yes, one of the very things flat companies are supposed to do away with can actually become exacerbated when businesses reorganize into a flatter structure. With fewer layers of middle management, executives are closer to the everyday goings-on of the employees.
A 14-year study of Fortune 500 companies showed that when companies de-layer by removing middle management layers, not only do the companies tend to hire more people at the executive level, but those executives tend to intervene even more often with everyday procedures than when more layers exist in the company.
Have you heard of Valve? It’s often referenced when people speak or write about leaderless companies. Upon further examination though, Valve proves to have a sort of ruling class within it – some ex-employees of the company have described the work culture as being similar to high school, with popular kids who have informal yet powerful influence over the workings of the company.
This dearth of truly bossless companies is because, as humans, we naturally tend to fill vacuums of power with some sort of hierarchical structure, whether formal or informal. So perhaps another drawback of the flat organizational structure is the difficulty we humans have in sticking to it.
---
Finding a balance.
So we’ve covered the qualities of both hierarchical and leaderless companies. But, as with many things in our world, there’s not a true dichotomy here. Most companies exist somewhere along the spectrum of a hierarchical to leaderless structure. The trick is finding the right balance for each company.
According to Foss and Klein, no business can truly exist without some kind of hierarchy. As we saw in the last section, Valve is often touted as an example of a leaderless company but still has an informal ruling class.
Another example of a mostly flat company is the widely known Wikipedia. The online encyclopedia is often cited as a successful, crowd-sourced, bossless endeavor. But much of its success is only possible with the support of hierarchical features.
A 2016 study by Indiana University found that most of Wikipedia’s procedures and norms were first implemented by a small group of users at the beginning of the endeavor. As the network grew, those norms largely stayed the same, guiding the course and style of the project.
Additionally, Wikipedia has multiple layers of background roles and rules involved in the production and upkeep of its pages. So even this well-known example of a supposedly flat company turns out to be a balance of both hierarchy and decentralization. Its balancing point is closer to the decentralization side of the spectrum, but the fact is that it’s a careful balance.
So how can a company decide on the right organizational structure? Well, there are a few key aspects about itself a company must evaluate to find a good mix of both hierarchy and employee empowerment.
The first, and perhaps most difficult, decision to make is about decision-making itself. Who should have the authority to make which decisions? Whoever is involved in deciding a company’s organizational structure must figure out which tasks and decisions to keep for themselves, and which ones to delegate to other people within the company. Often, managers are employed specifically to manage this delegation.
Consider a company that has more than a handful of employees or has multiple teams with a lot of coordination required to accomplish overarching goals. For this kind of company, it would probably be beneficial to create at least one role dedicated to managing that coordination and task delegation.
Once that’s decided, you then need to figure out how many employees or teams necessitate designating a manager. Unfortunately, there’s no one true answer to this. The specific company and circumstances within which it works determine when a distinct manager might be needed. Let’s look at an example of this dilemma.
Have you ever considered what it takes to grow, harvest, and distribute tomatoes? Well, Chris Rufer, the founder and sole owner of Morning Star, has. Rufer founded Morning Star in 1970. This food processing company focuses on tomatoes and operates on a near-bossless model. The secret? Contracts.
Morning Star employees work by creating contract upon contract among themselves. These mini-contracts function much like job descriptions but with a lot more specificity. The contracts allow workers to clearly define expectations and to make decisions about how to operate without the input of anyone beyond those affected by the contract. This method works extremely well for the company’s 600 main employees – with additional seasonal workers joining during harvesting.
Okay, that may be well and good for tomatoes, but what about a bigger, more complex company? What organizational structure might work best for a company comprised of many interdependent teams working on varied projects and timelines? For this, let’s consider another fruit, Apple. But this Apple is the one with a capital A – the tech company, not the fruit.
When Steve Jobs stepped away from the company, it struggled. Upon his return, he cut many projects and went against popular opinion to redirect efforts. His top-down decision-making is lauded as the reason for Apple’s turnaround and ultimate astounding successes. Without the quick implementation and unified vision behind Job’s decisions, the company might well have foundered.
Which brings us back to our original question: What balance of organizational structure is best for a company? Well, the answer is that it truly depends on the goals, type of work, and environment of the business.
---
In the end, there’s no clear answer to whether a hierarchical or flat organizational structure is better. As we discovered, both structures have their benefits and drawbacks. Ultimately, neither a strictly hierarchical nor a fully bossless company is completely practical. The best balance of these styles can only be determined for each individual business on its own. Employees often don’t need input from their managers to accomplish day-to-day tasks and even some small-scale, unusual situations. But in times of upheaval and struggle – or with great growth in a company – the supportive structure of managers and top-down decision-making can be essential.
October 1, 2022
With WHY MANAGERS MATTER, Nicolai J. Foss and Peter G. Klein make a compelling, convincing argument in favor of management. In a time when common wisdom is overwhelmingly against hierarchy, managers, and structure, this powerful book is an essential reminder that there is no single, ideal organization model, that managers can provide essential support and guidance to less experienced, heads-down in projects and other individuals needing a crucial fortress to create, innovate, and drive a company. As I read, I absorbed the case studies, many perspectives, and intelligent prose that somehow made a serious, groundbreaking thesis an entertaining, absorbing read. I received a copy of this book and these opinions are my own, unbiased thoughts.
January 17, 2023
Nothing ground-breaking, but I appreciated the common sense of the authors.
November 7, 2022
This is a fantastic book that will be of value both to working managers and management scholars. The two authors, who are authorities within management research, provide an essay access into the enormous literature of management practices. Yet, this book is by no means an academic exercise, rather the insights are provided using illustrative, and often amusing, examples. Moreover, the many theoretical insights are communicated for the practicing community. While the main aim of the book may be to refute the hyped notion of bossless company, it provides so much more! Chiefly, it provides actionable insight into how modern companies are, and possibly should be, managed. The book is a much need counterweight to the many, often less rigorously researched, books that propose a quick fix approach to the difficult task of management.
August 13, 2023
Edited an adaptation from the book here: https://sloanreview.mit.edu/article/r...
Reviewed book here: https://www.strategy-business.com/art...
Reviewed book here: https://www.strategy-business.com/art...
February 17, 2023
Yikes. This is a really hard slog through a long literature review to get to only 1 (maybe 1.5) chapter of actual content.
I emphatically agree with the authors' point that management and organizational structure matter and that no organization can really run itself and in fact, anyone who believes in flat organizations should be at the most basic level unemployable.
And yet, the book still sucked ass!
Yes, this is going to be another extended diversity gripe. Buckle up.
Okay. Educational diversity (attending different Ivy League/prestigious schools) is not now nor will it ever be diversity. This is repackaging a form of privilege held largely by white, able-bodied, straight, cisgender men. Nothing more. It's not real. It's not diversity. Try again.
The way this book is written centers very heavily on white male experience and perspective. I had the feeling that the authors could never have imagined a person of color or an LGBTQ person reading their book.
It is mildly transphobic (or cis-centric at least) in that the book always defaulted to binary pronouns for hypothetical examples, rather than using the more modern, gender neutral they/them pronouns for essentially hypothetical people. This is becoming a well-established practice. One of the authors may be a christian nationalist (sent kids to christian schools), so this choice may originate from there. Or it could be ignorance...which beggars belief, because the book is well-researched and on a complex topic. The authors are unbearable; they're not morons.
Bigger picture...the authors never examined the impact of flat hierarchies vs traditional ones on marginalized workers, which in this decade seems to be a huge blind spot. The risk of bullying and othering would seem higher in a flat organization where charismatic individuals are likely to run roughshod over outsiders/the marginalized; however, traditional structures have never been good to these groups either. Would have made for an interesting chapter. I would have liked to have insight into that.
There was also a lot of random, unnecessary disdain for younger workers. Not just Gen Z. I think anyone under 45 (maybe 50). It wasn't comfortable to read (I am 43). The expectations of younger generations are no longer unusual. They are the numerical norm now in many places. These guys need to have some long, meaningful talks with their grand kids. Business writers need to stop being like this. Otherwise, people are going to stop reading these kinds of books and learn about these kinds of topics from Youtube and TikTok instead.
Overall, I say with my full chest here: skip this one. Managers do matter, but hearing about it from these authors won't help. Also, again, it's a slog.
I emphatically agree with the authors' point that management and organizational structure matter and that no organization can really run itself and in fact, anyone who believes in flat organizations should be at the most basic level unemployable.
And yet, the book still sucked ass!
Yes, this is going to be another extended diversity gripe. Buckle up.
Okay. Educational diversity (attending different Ivy League/prestigious schools) is not now nor will it ever be diversity. This is repackaging a form of privilege held largely by white, able-bodied, straight, cisgender men. Nothing more. It's not real. It's not diversity. Try again.
The way this book is written centers very heavily on white male experience and perspective. I had the feeling that the authors could never have imagined a person of color or an LGBTQ person reading their book.
It is mildly transphobic (or cis-centric at least) in that the book always defaulted to binary pronouns for hypothetical examples, rather than using the more modern, gender neutral they/them pronouns for essentially hypothetical people. This is becoming a well-established practice. One of the authors may be a christian nationalist (sent kids to christian schools), so this choice may originate from there. Or it could be ignorance...which beggars belief, because the book is well-researched and on a complex topic. The authors are unbearable; they're not morons.
Bigger picture...the authors never examined the impact of flat hierarchies vs traditional ones on marginalized workers, which in this decade seems to be a huge blind spot. The risk of bullying and othering would seem higher in a flat organization where charismatic individuals are likely to run roughshod over outsiders/the marginalized; however, traditional structures have never been good to these groups either. Would have made for an interesting chapter. I would have liked to have insight into that.
There was also a lot of random, unnecessary disdain for younger workers. Not just Gen Z. I think anyone under 45 (maybe 50). It wasn't comfortable to read (I am 43). The expectations of younger generations are no longer unusual. They are the numerical norm now in many places. These guys need to have some long, meaningful talks with their grand kids. Business writers need to stop being like this. Otherwise, people are going to stop reading these kinds of books and learn about these kinds of topics from Youtube and TikTok instead.
Overall, I say with my full chest here: skip this one. Managers do matter, but hearing about it from these authors won't help. Also, again, it's a slog.
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