Gear Up or Tool Down?
How to pack for your management journey.
Packing is a balancing act. When preparing for a trip, one must select which equipment to bring, conscious that she will need to carry it. The result usually involves multifunctional gear, with a few comfort items and specialty equipment for emergency situations. The adequate mix depends on the nature of the endeavour, the traveller’s experience, as well as her ability to repack or adjust along the way.
In many ways, this analogy is applicable to organisations, where productivity-seeking processes, boosted by digitalisation, have paved the way for the multiplication of tools of all kinds. Still, from a top management perspective, the value and necessity of each tool may be difficult to assess when considered altogether.
One way to map management tools is by considering their level of complexity (i.e., whether they require expertise to use them), and their purpose (singular or multiple) to articulate trade-offs between more basic multipurpose tools, and sharper specialty tools. When going hiking, would you rather take a Swiss-army knife or a bushcraft knife?
“How do you decide on that trade-off?”, asked the Mouse.
Considerations for selecting a tool may include their complementarity, integration to the existing work environment, and the level of skills in your team.
However, one’s ability to leverage a tool is not a matter of skill only. To understand what else matters, one can distinguish between “productivity tools” and “navigation instruments”.
Productivity tools aim at working more efficiently. Besides the criteria outlined above, such tools require a well-established management culture, especially as they get more complex. Indeed, implementing collaborative tools is not enough to foster collaboration.
Navigation instruments aim at supporting decision-making. Their effectiveness depends on the clarity of the organization’ strategic framework, as their output can only be analysed considering a set of objectives or plans. For instance, the value of reporting depends greatly on how much its user understands the overall strategy.
Another example at the crossroad of productivity tools and navigation instruments would be AI-powered data management tools. They have the potential to supercharge most functional practices. Yet, the quality of insights derived from big data depends on the clarity of strategic and prospective frameworks. In addition, the ability to leverage them across business functions is a matter of management culture.
In a nutshell, when “packing for your management journey”, start by reflecting on the clarity of your management culture and strategic framework. If in doubt, tool down. The more tools there are, the more difficult it is to reflect on culture and strategy. Until you become a more experienced hiker, there is no need to carry unnecessary burden along the way.
Similarly, if you find a tool useful or useless, what does it say about your strategy or management culture?
Baptiste Raymond - 03/2022.