micro-entrepreneurs , by adopting a growth mindset within a culture of freedom and responsibility , writes Rita McGrath , Professor of Management at Columbia Business School .
An inflection point is a change , typically in the external environment , that exerts a10-fold force on your business . COVID-19 represents a classic inflection point . Companies , such as casual clothing manufacturer Entireworld , are thriving and struggling to meet demand ; others , including office clothing producer Brooks Brothers , are facing collapsing demand and bankruptcy . As with other inflection points , the pandemic has accelerated an explosion of investment in digital work and in enabling remote working , where the conventional strictures of bureaucratic management are notably absent .
Consider the lessons we might learn from the success of Instagrammers YouTubers and high-value podcasters . Because the tools of creativity have now become democratised , and these creative people are able to force direct connections with supporters , they can build unique businesses without the overhang of a corporate parent or gatekeepers . They are micro-entrepreneurs , creating value for their ecosystem and using the feedback from that ecosystem to guide their decisions . Their experiences reveal a truth that escapes many executives in large organisations : that by managing employees essentially as poor substitutes for robots , enormous potential value is being completely overlooked .
Mobilising entrepreneurial talent
At a previous company , Reed Hastings , co-founder and CEO of Netflix , realised the processes he was putting in place to stamp out errors were having unintended consequences – stifling creativity , creating an unwillingness to experiment and a fear of standing out – that were antithetical to the goals of an innovative organisation .
When he founded Netflix , he determined to create a culture of freedom and responsibility in which high-talent individuals were given enormous scope to make decisions that , in other organisations , would have been reserved for only a few individuals at the ‘ top ’ of a hierarchy . He credits this stance with powering Netflix through inflection points ( the growth of DVD by mail , the rise of streaming , and now the mastery of created content ) that would have been fatal to a less flexible company .
As Gary Hamel and Michele Zanini point out in Humanocracy , we now have an opportunity to rethink the way we design jobs , in order to mobilise , within organisations , the kind of micro-entrepreneurial talent that those Instagram , YouTube and podcasters display . But doing this requires changing our mindset to one of growth , rather than control .
By managing employees essentially as poor substitutes for robots , enormous potential value is being completely overlooked
We know , thanks to the work of scholars such as Zeynep Ton and Jeffrey Pfeffer , that supposedly ‘ low-skill ’ jobs can be a powerful engine of adaptiveness and growth when they are designed as good jobs . Good jobs have a path to growth – in which individuals , whatever their position , are given the opportunity to master new challenges , grow their capabilities and share in the value their energies create .
Too often , corporate workers are disengaged , over-controlled , poorly paid interchangeable cogs in a wheel of control . Seen only as units of cost , they are not supported as the uniquely human engines of creativity they could be . Imagine that they were free to experiment and problem solve , encouraged to find new ways to add value to customers and given the right tools to discover novel solutions . Such a workforce might well constitute the best future-proofing any organisation can possess .
Rita McGrath is Professor of Management at Columbia Business School and a globally recognised expert on strategy , innovation and growth , with an emphasis on corporate entrepreneurship .