Management by being interested

Johnnie Moore

Johnnie Moore

I’m Johnnie Moore, and I help people work better together

Euan Semple “Changing Innovation” (lift09 France EN) from Lift Conference on Vimeo.

Euan has posted his talk from LIFT last year. Good stuff including his mini-rant against the costs of pomposity. I wanted to highlight the last chunk starting around 12 mins.

This is where he argues that management doesn’t disappear when organisations use social network tools but it changes. Here’s how he describes his role after the BBC introduced a forum and wiki.

I spent a lot of time and a lot of effort being interested in that space, being interested in what people were doing… and noticing things. Much harder work than managing something in a conventional sense. But by being there, noticing and being engaged, I had influence.

He talks about this as a fundamental difference in management style. Makes sense to me, especially with my notice more, change less mantra running.

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