Quote of the Week...from George S. Patton

Don't tell people how to do things, tell them what to do and let them surprise you with their results.
                                                               ---George S. Patton

George Smith Patton, Jr. was a famous general during World War II, commanding the Third Army through north Africa and the invasion of Sicily and the Seventh during the invasion of France and Germany.  He has always been known as a tough, demanding leader strong on discipline and personal responsibility...and of acting decisively in a timely manner.  To Patton, too many leaders plan too much when perhaps less perfect preparation and more prompt implementation would have produced better results.  To this end he depended on the resourcefulness of his officers and the soldiers under them to solve problems as the situations arose on the battlefield.  It isn't always possible to be able to pull out a manual that explains in detail how to do things, and those in leadership positions can't always explain their orders step-by-step.  So it is necessary to place some trust in those of subordinate positions to use their own abilities to come up with solutions.  This not only applies to combat situations in war, but also within the workplace and carries an important application to life in general...

With the above quote comes the implied assumption that those told to do things have been already judged to be competent at those tasks...whether a surgeon, repairperson, soldier,  or anyone else with a specialty, they obviously need much detailed training before reaching the point where the General's statement applies.  But sometimes within the managerial structure of an organization, folks forget that their subordinates have already been vested as to their competency and intelligence...and are quite able to come up with methods and solutions without someone up the authority ladder continually hovering over them and dictating each step and how to do it.  The analogy carries further, too, to how we manage ourselves in our personal lives: when faced with a challenge that involves variables and a bit of on-the-spot decision making, it won't do to beforehand sit down and try to plan out every contingency before even beginning.  In other words, much of the time you just have to wing it...