Leadership is disappointing people at a rate they can absorb. Leadership is ultimately about driving change, while management is about creating stability. Stability is important in a work environment, but confronting challenges and realizing new ideas require discomfort.
This means that you and your teams must abandon the stable and familiar in favor of an uncertain—but exciting—new direction.
-Excerpt from Scaling People by Claire Johnson - Former COO of Stripe
There is a difference between the manager's schedule and the maker's schedule.
Managers get paid for judgment—the more valuable your decisions, the bigger the job and economic compensation (if that’s what you want).
Makers create—ideas, art, code, products, etc.
Information is a manager's tool. We get it in meetings, emails, and messages. This is why managers spend most of their time there. A tool of the maker is time—time to work on the problem they’re trying to solve.
Managers and makers operate on two different schedules. Managers prioritize meetings because they are effective decision-making mechanisms. Makers need long periods of uninterrupted deep work focused on one problem. That is the opposite of managers.
This is from Paul Graham's original 2009 essay titled Manager Vs. Maker,
When you’re operating on the maker’s schedule, meetings are a disaster. A single meeting can blow a whole afternoon, by breaking it into two pieces each too small to do anything hard in.
There are at least two issues.
Managers impose their way of working on makers. This can destroy value. Since managers are usually “in charge,” they get their way.
Managers don’t realize they are makers and only operate on a manager schedule.
“Busy” is a way to measure productivity. It’s not always accurate. Clearing your inbox or filling your schedule is a badge of honor. Taking four hours to sit on a bench with a notebook to think through a problem is not. Maybe it should be.
My business requires an incredible amount of analysis. We have brilliant humans who help us produce a view on business, sector, and economy. To do this, they need time to do deep work without interruptions. They need to make. The issue is that we don’t give them that time, and they can’t demand it.
This is an unlock for me for two reasons. First, as a manager, “My actions can destroy value when I don’t give makers time to make.”
Second,
"I need maker time.”
Whether it’s about work or life, sometimes the best thing you can do is grab a notebook and four hours of uninterrupted time. Time to think, find clarity, create, and work through important ideas. This time “making” helps me create new things and gives me energy. Maybe it might work for you, too.
Take care, Kelly
PS: Paul Graham started this discussion in 2009 with this essay. Farnham Street continued it with this essay. Both do a much better job of digging deeper into this than I do. If this idea interests you, I encourage you to read those articles.
PPS: If you know someone who might appreciate this, please grab the link and text it to them or forward this email.
Maker Time