Swanson's Unwritten Rules of Management

http://www.leadershipnow.com/minute0014.html

by wallflower • 15 years ago

26 8 15 years ago

danbmil99• 15 years ago

The article seems to say he first presented these rules in a powerpoint presentation, and then they were published in 1944.

frobozz• 15 years ago

The timeline of the narrative does seem a little confusing, but it's not wrong.

Some of the rules were published by King as part of The Unwritten Laws of Engineering in 1944.

The whole collection of rules were published by Swanson as The Unwritten Laws of Management, after his own powerpoint presentation.

SoftwareMaven• 15 years ago

If anybody knows how to get a hold of the book, I would greatly appreciate the pointer. Apparently, once upon a time, Raytheon would send you a copy for free if you asked nicely, but the request mechanism is gone now.

dhs• 15 years ago

It seems like Raytheon stopped distribution because it was discovered that most of Swanson's "unwritten rules" had actually been written before, by other people, and he had just copied them without attribution: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/03/business/03cnd-raytheon.ht...

(hat tip to brl)

JanezStupar• 15 years ago

> Never direct a complaint to the top. A serious offense is to "cc" a person's boss.

All right, I have seen nothing good come of breaking this rule - for many complex reasons. However what is one to do, when his PHB is incompetent/misinformed and supposedly damaging the company? Just quit? Is quitting the appropriate response to everything? Where are we (as species) going if we resign when something bad happens. Go away start anew and have people resign on us for our misbehaving?

Edit: Also what does one do when lets say - working as a contractor and people that hired you intentionally/out of stupidity do everything contrary to what they were supposed to do (a mission critical project and you wait 2 weeks for any response). You quit? You let yourself be sacrificed as a scapegoat. Or do you just roll over and die?

PakG1• 15 years ago

This is really tough, and the question relies on the nature of your organization. If your organization is well-run and has clear escalation paths, then you follow the process, and the process will sort out the situation out for you. If there are no such processes in place in your organization, then you either rely on your direct relationship with that guy's boss (if you have one), or more commonly, escalate to your own manager, and your own manager dialogues with that guy's manager.

brl• 15 years ago

The first step should always be to confront your boss directly with your concerns. If that isn't a realistic option, it's probably for the best to go work somewhere else under competent leadership.

erikpukinskis• 15 years ago

I was certain this was going to go here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uIZ4ckmd9-I

Swanson's Unwritten Rules of Management

Related Stories