Mike Andes says the best managers do three things: spot problems, propose solutions, and execute them. Managers who only identify problems are "cancer" to the organization. Those who do all three can double your throughput.
Everyone's like, I'm really good manager because I can identify problems. If you can just identify problems, you are what we call a cancer to the organization because it doesn't take a rocket scientist to identify a problem. And if all you do in an organization or all people in your organization do as a manager is identify problems, they are a waste of space. They are constantly going to drag the organization down. They're going to slow everything down. They'll never be able to adapt. They'll always look for problems and issues in every single aspect of the business. They can find the problems. Now, you need these people. To identify problems. But a great manager can do all 3 of these things. On the flip side, there are people that can execute very well, but they're not good enough at being able to be introspective and look at a system and find the problem because they're so optimistic. And there are people that are so optimistic that they cannot identify a problem, but they can do great execution. And so I realized when it came to a manager, I was always expecting them to do all 3. But sometimes people can only do one. Now, the best of the best managers and leaders that are able to increase the throughput of your organization can identify a problem. Hey, that's a problem. They got— but here's all I'm not just gonna bring you a problem, I'm also gonna bring a solution that I think can actually fix it. And then they can actually take the solution once you've signed off on it or you got approval, and they can go execute on it.
