IPUrbia

Interesting article on the concept of the “professional manager” versus the master craftsman.

“The ‘professional’ manager earns no respect from the workforce because he can’t show them how to build a product or to meet their immediate concerns,” Mr Protzman wrote in an e-mail to Kenneth and William Hopper, authors of the recently published management history The Puritan Gift. “The workers are frustrated because no one will listen to them. He typically ends up trying to make friends with them, in an attempt to persuade them to do his bidding. Most workers have no incentive to co-operate because they figure they can wear him out, or outlast him, or both. Our managerial culture is so far behind Toyota’s that it’s just not funny.”

But surely today’s business elite dismisses such talk as sentimental, and relishes the speed and versatility of the generalist super-manager? Actually, no. Listen to the views of McKinsey director Lowell Bryan and his colleague Claudia Joyce, who offer this analysis in their new book Mobilizing Minds (to be reviewed in these pages on Thursday).

“In the digital age, professional work is often what produces the most wealth. It is also often the work that is most difficult to manage well. And indeed, by its nature, it is more ‘craft’ work than production work,” Mr Bryan and Ms Joyce write. “As such, the frontline manager of such work needs to be not only a good manager but also actually a ‘master craftsperson’. Scientists need to be led by chief scientists, investment bankers need to led by master bankers, and lawyers need to be led by a general counsel, and so on.”

Read it…