Hi Reader,
"Be yourself; everyone else is already taken."
Oscar Wilde
I've been interested in the concept of “self-management”, which is the idea that people are fully capable of managing their own behavior, time, tasks, and emotions in order to achieve goals without constant supervision.
In theory, it sounds super efficient. Teams rely on peer relationships, shared information, and distributed decision-making to get work done without heavy oversight.
In other words, people take care of their own stuff and get it done. Without drama.
In reality, I spend a fair amount of my day reminding people that self-management does not include reading minds, chasing updates, or magically predicting deadlines. I notice many of us are still working on the “self” part.
That said, great self-managers do exist and they stand out. Give them direction, and they’re off. No handholding, just quick direction and off they go.
If you’re the one in the weeds of a project, here are a few ways to self-manage:
- Talk to the right people, especially those impacted.
- Focus on what needs doing, not your title.
- Pick things up, hand things off, keep things moving.
- Share information. Hoarding helps no one.
- Address issues directly. Skip the hallway politics.
- Let reality guide the plan, not the other way around.
And if you’re an executive trying to get your team to self-manage, here are a few tips:
- Make information visible. People can’t act on what they can’t see.
- Encourage collaboration, not dependency.
- Step in less. Yes, feels uncomfortable at first.
- Support the stumbles. That’s where the learning happens.
Self-management is not about everyone doing whatever they want and hoping for the best. It takes awareness, communication, and a willingness to step up without being asked.
The irony is the better people get at self-managing, the less management is needed at all.
But it does not happen overnight. It builds in small moments. So start simple. Pick one thing this week you would normally wait on and move it forward. See what happens.
And if you or your team are stuck somewhere between total autonomy and “who the heck owns this,” that is where we can help.
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Barbara Kephart, PMP
Founder and Chief Project Officer
Projects Pivot
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