Lou Holtz (spectacularly winning coach of Notre Dame) was well-known for teaching everything he knew to his coaching staff…. w/ the result that many of them left Notre Dame & became famous college & professional coaches elsewhere. So he was once asked, “aren’t you worried that you’re ‘giving it all away’?”
& Lou said “no! I teach them everything I know, & want them to be the best coaches they can.”
but the questioner persisted– “but aren’t you concerned they just take everything you’ve taught them & leave?”
& Lou said “no. I’ve got a waiting list a mile long of all the best Assistant Coaches in the country, who all want to coach at Notre Dame. And thus we get the [benefits] of their abilities for 2+ years while they’re learning… I think that’s a fair bargain”.
…& this is just as true in the workplace.
The Manager who keeps information, skills, & decisions close-to-the-vest is not investing in either the wellbeing of his personnel, nor the viability or effectiveness of his Team as a whole. I’ve met quite a few seasoned managers who proudly declaim “you’ve gotta keep technical ppl on a short leash; they always seem to want to ‘dress-up’ the requirements with the latest/sexiest bells’n'whistles. You’ve gotta ‘rein-them-in’”.
And that can usually work reasonably well in the short-term; you will deliver exactly what the Business asked-for, & probably in a timely manner. The problem is, over time, you’ll notice that those [solutions] being delivered by your Team aren’t very creative anymore (example: just fixing the ‘symptom’, rather than solving the source-problem). Since part of a good software analyst’s job is “systems analysis”, ie. optimizing business-processes, the best technical person is one who not only knows the technical details, but is creative/flexible at applying them.
But if you-as-Manager have built a habit of discouraging ‘creative thought’ from your technical team, it will be you who is in trouble, next time you bid or are tasked a big (and/or ‘interesting’) project. What you’ll find is that your best creative minds aren’t producing terrific solutions [or worse, have long-since-left for more interesting work elsewhere], & you’ll deliver less functionality, & slower, than a flexible, enthusiastic team whose members’ creativity has been rewarded.
When you hold your Team back, it’s not only their career-growth that suffers, but it’s yours as well (b/c you won’t be performing at optimum). So it’s really in your best interest to ensure that your ppl have time to explore their own solutions… even if you think they’re ‘barking up a tree’. Your job as Manager is to let them know the Strategy, check-in once in a while to see if they need any escalations, & then get the hell outta the way.
If you cannot set direction, delegate, support your ppl no matter what, & always take full responsibility… it won’t just be that you’ll be a [bad] manager of a low-morale group…
…you’ll also be severely outperformed (both in the marketplace & in your own workplace) by Managers/Leaders who can.
Tags: learning+teaching, management