Tim Bursch

I was listening to this podcast by 37signals on work. They tell the story of MeetUp and how they tackled a huge amount of projects.

You can listen here. What got me was the paradigm of work. Did management assign each team a project? Nope. Management told them to figure it out and literally left the room.
The developers self-organized around projects they cared about and went to work. Wow. Is that even management?

Seems like leadership. Both at the top and the bottom. The managers trusted that their teams would create solutions in freedom instead of control. The teams took that belief and trust and lead forward.

So, how would organizations create more space for teams to bubble-up solutions?

Here are a few possible key elements:

• Absolute trust. We are all adults. So give people the chance to be responsible.
• Respect. Be confident in others ideas.
• Collaboration. Not competition.

What else would you add? What other stories of bottom-up leadership have you heard?

Tags: collaboration, leadership.