The Two Paths of a Manager - by Dan Hockenmaier

The first is probably what comes to mind when most people think of a “bad manager”: micromanagers who get into every detail and undermine the autonomy of their team. However the inverse problem is at least as common, especially in startups: “macromanagers” who give too little direction to their team and undermine their performance. A large part of the journey to becoming a better manager is about correcting (and often over-correcting) until you find the optimal balance. The two paths look something like this: Too often, managers wait until a crisis to course correct. Micromanagers are usually good at getting results in the short term, at the expense of eroding trust and losing engagement from the team over time. Crises often show up as people problems, like someone quitting without providing enough warning to do anything about it. Macromanagers initially create happier teams, but they are likely to produce worse results. Crises often first manifest as output problems: the team fails at

The first is probably what comes to mind when most people think of a “bad manager”: micromanagers who get into every detail and undermine the autonomy of their team. However the inverse problem is at least as common, especially in startups: “macromanagers” who give too little direction to their team and undermine their performance. A large part of the journey to becoming a better manager is about correcting (and often over-correcting) until you find the optimal balance. The two paths look something like this: Too often, managers wait until a crisis to course correct. Micromanagers are usually