It comes down to managment style. Douglas McGregor broke it down into a framework called ‘Theory X and Theory Y.’ What you describe is an owner (or manager) who subscribes to Theory X.
The reality is there is most likely a Theory X or Y spectrum of employees on any team.
Based on the Pareto Principle, roughly 80% of the consequences come from 20% of the causes (the 80/20 rule). So the top 20% of your performers are going to produce 80% of your results. Unfortunately, some managers constrain the entire team (including that valuable top 20%) with micromanging to keep the bottom 80% performing at standard. This makes little sense. You would be better to ignore the bottom 80% and focus on helping the top 20% instead of holding them back.
Conversely, it stands to reason that 20% of the worst employees are creating 80% of the terrible results. What to do? We can see here is that it really makes no sense to manage the entire team as one homogeneous unit. You have to approach people as individuals and deal with their contribution, level of competence, and level of trust accordingly.
In addition, many managers have not figured out how to shift from quantifying inputs to quantifying outputs. What matters more? The amout of hours worked or the value created? The bottom line is if an employee is generating 10x sales at 1x effort, that is better than 1x sales at 10x effort. Profit and revenue should be more important than bums in seats. Process is important but the process shouldn’t encumber the business, it should free it.
It comes down to managment style. Douglas McGregor broke it down into a framework called ‘Theory X and Theory Y.’ What you describe is an owner (or manager) who subscribes to Theory X.
https://educationlibrary.org/theory-x-and-theory-y-douglas-mcgregor/
The reality is there is most likely a Theory X or Y spectrum of employees on any team.
Based on the Pareto Principle, roughly 80% of the consequences come from 20% of the causes (the 80/20 rule). So the top 20% of your performers are going to produce 80% of your results. Unfortunately, some managers constrain the entire team (including that valuable top 20%) with micromanging to keep the bottom 80% performing at standard. This makes little sense. You would be better to ignore the bottom 80% and focus on helping the top 20% instead of holding them back.
Conversely, it stands to reason that 20% of the worst employees are creating 80% of the terrible results. What to do? We can see here is that it really makes no sense to manage the entire team as one homogeneous unit. You have to approach people as individuals and deal with their contribution, level of competence, and level of trust accordingly.
In addition, many managers have not figured out how to shift from quantifying inputs to quantifying outputs. What matters more? The amout of hours worked or the value created? The bottom line is if an employee is generating 10x sales at 1x effort, that is better than 1x sales at 10x effort. Profit and revenue should be more important than bums in seats. Process is important but the process shouldn’t encumber the business, it should free it.