Recognizing the Hierarchy Trap
Whether we’re talking the boardroom at Procter & Gamble or the board of your PTA, you can count on hierarchy to screw things up. It’s a paradox. On one hand, hierarchy provides people a basic orientation—it defines accountability and who has to answer to whom. On the other hand, it perverts relationships, bleeding candor and quality from almost every discussion that’s held. As a feature of everyday work, hierarchy is a dimension people can’t do without, but one that causes them not to do very well.
There’s little question that hierarchy is the backbone of almost every well-functioning organization. It provides ...
Get Don't Kill the Bosses! now with the O’Reilly learning platform.
O’Reilly members experience books, live events, courses curated by job role, and more from O’Reilly and nearly 200 top publishers.
