The Truth About Getting Your Point Across: ...And Nothing but the Truth

Truth 49Informal Doesn't Mean Ineffective

Earlier in my career I worked on a high-profile project to make some major modifications to our firm's commercial manufacturing software that we sold to clients. Our firm's management assigned a very seasoned, knowledgeable senior manager to oversee the project, who I'll call "Brian." Brian exemplified Management by Walking Around (MBWA).^[9] He spent his days walking among the more than 100 employees assigned to the project, taking part in informal conversations about the work being done, what employees saw as some of the problems, and what employees thought should be done about the problems. As one of the managers, I was frustrated by Brian's style of management, because he asked me about some of the ...