You know what we’ve found? Magical things happen when employees know they’ll get to be king for a week. Gone is the complaining about what management is forcing them to do, because rotating management gives them a clear perspective of both sides of the fence. Employees will step up and grow if you give them the chance.
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Un-Manage Your Employees, an article for My Business by yours truly on the self-managing teams at 37signals.
Un-Manage Your Employees, an article for My Business by yours truly on the self-managing teams at 37signals.
David O.
on 24 Jan 11It also helps that you guys hire the right employees. If you hire people who are unethical, people who don’t really care for their work then the system won’t work. It’s a good thing that 37signals is very picky during the hiring process and won’t settle for mediocrity.
Devan
on 25 Jan 11As long as the employee has the intrinsic aptitude to lead or manage, then it can work, however in my 25 years of owning a business, I’ve realised that many workers are quite happy, and quite productive just being a drone.
Forcing such people into a leadership situation just makes them uncomfortable and in one case nearly led to an anxiety attack.
Nothing wrong with the concept though, and many of our employees have gone on to start businesses of their own. I like to think that the experience they had in my company gave them the confidence to do so.
Tim
on 25 Jan 11Linky not working!
Eugen Ciur
on 25 Jan 11Very good idea. However there is nothing new in it. In my country, once a year there is a “teacher’s day”. During this day all students exchange with their teacher in their roles – students will teach and give marks, but teachers will learn, listen and receive marks. It is very exciting to see and manage situation from other side of the fence.
The Modern Programmer
on 25 Jan 11I think the idea of rotating managerial positions is great, but isn’t there a chance that team direction will become unclear as a result of these changes?
Personally I don’t believe that good software teams need managers at all, and I explain why in my blog post here:
http://themodernprogrammer.com/post/managers-chopping-blocks-and-i-dont-agree-with-that-in-the-workplace/
Grayson S
on 25 Jan 11As David O and Devan point out, the competence and aptitude to manage oneself are critical for this structure to work without stressing out folks more than necessary. In my own business relationships I take ownership and responsibility because that is what I want. In the case of one relationship, I have more freedom than I could ever ask for. There is no management, no “approval,” nothing of the sort … it works great! But it’s not for everyone.
That said, I think competence and aptitude are learned, and that many work environments do nothing to foster personal growth in these areas.
For those who are interested: a lot of these ideas come from Ricardo Semler’s “Maverick”—it was shared on SvN many years go.
Grayson S
on 25 Jan 11Eugen, what country do you live in? I love that idea! This is part of the public school system there?
TJ
on 25 Jan 11Very interesting… Anything that helps with perspective is a good thing, in my opinion.
Hamid
on 26 Jan 11It’s improve and upgrade culture of employees in a company. Both managers and employees upgrade culture of company.
This discussion is closed.