Being busy is not the same as being productive.

Most managers cannot tell the difference.

Andy Grove could.

He ran Intel.

He also wrote High Output Management in 1983.

It is still the best management book written.

Nothing published since comes close.

I reread it at the start of each year.

Here is the core idea:

Your output as a manager is not what you personally produce.

It is the output of your team plus every team you influence.

That one shift changes how you think

about the entire task of management.

Grove built his system around six moves:

1️⃣ Master the 1:1. It is the subordinate's meeting, not yours. Let them set the agenda. Listen more than you talk.

2️⃣ Run tight staff meetings. If it can be an email, kill the meeting.

3️⃣ Push decisions down. The person closest to the data should decide.

You approve. You do not originate.

4️⃣ Match your management style to task-relevant maturity.

New to the task: structured and hands-on.

Experienced: delegate and monitor.

Most managers do this backwards.

5️⃣ Train your people yourself. Grove called it the highest-leverage activity a manager can do. He did it himself at Intel. No delegating this one.

6️⃣ Measure output indicators, not activity indicators.

What shipped, not what was started.

Grove also named three things that quietly kill management:

1️⃣ Meetings with no decisions.

2️⃣ Require one decision or cancel the meeting.

3️⃣ Managers doing individual contributor work.

Managers are not paid to do.

Managers are paid to multiply.

Save this graphic.

Put it to work this week.

What's a favorite Andy Grove-ism of yours? 👇

Companies are becoming tech stacks.

We are all becoming companies.

- j - 🤓 🙏

♻️ Restack to help your network today.

📬 Subscribe to Operating by John Brewton, my bestselling Substack newsletter.