Agile or Top-down Management: Which Should a Leader Use?

by Julie Clements Promoter

Business avenues have grown rapidly and as these grow, the number of seminars, meetings, and presentations also increase. All these seminars and meetings contain highly refined thoughts and educative materials that need to be recorded and with business transcription service these discussions can be documented into accurate reports for future references. Important talks and discussions are common for any business set up and ideas originate in such meetings that are important for business management.

Running a business is not an easy task; it involves many activities from human resources to operational issues to growth plans that require attention. As technology is improving, many changes are happening in human and machine interface and businesses need to be up to date and remain competitive. Any business requires a management team with an experienced team leader who can remove the managerial burden from the shoulders of business owners and ensure that the team members are fulfilling their roles. However, most of the organizations face the problem of identifying the right management style. There are many articles available on the internet that recommends an agile management style whereas some suggest the top down approach. Both of these approaches have their time and place. As the business starts growing, a good management style is also important to keep the team engaged and achieve business goals. Agile management can be adopted by start-ups to execute on goals. Companies that have a lower headcount and revenue are much easier to align and drive towards systematic execution of tasks. Each completed task gives the team the opportunity to measure its impact and also make strategic decisions about where to focus their effort for the next few weeks.

A strong and agile leadership is vital to manage a large workforce and it may need to develop into something new with a different level of organizational maturity. The next stage of growth needs definite objectives, strategies and should hold teams accountable for quality execution. Along with agile management, you can also include top down management into your internal methodology as the two styles are complementary. This helps the team and managers to work together to identify the opportunities that have the most potential to move the needle for the business.

Agile management needs transparency and it helps to make informed decisions. With the integration of business intelligence and ERP along with concerted work management tools, business leaders can get an instant picture regarding the robustness of projects or entire divisions with just a few clicks.

Agile management of various teams and departments can serve to accelerate growth by reducing the time-to-value of growth initiatives like marketing while also ensuring that a project is effective before ramping it up to scale. All projects, big or small, involve multiple teams and stakeholders to inform the direction of projects. When an agile team operates without awareness of the work in the organization, it can get misaligned with the other teams. Proper communication between teams is essential to help with such problems. Here the leadership can help in aligning teams to ensure a smooth handoff of work from one to another. The leadership should lay out their priorities that are in line with the specific growth stage of the company.

When agile management and top down management are brought together, it will add predictability to the company’s growth. A growth roadmap that is strategically charted out by the year will ensure that your business emerges in the market as steady and well planned and this consistency will be appreciated by your customers. The goal is to improve your sales and revenue by following the same pattern predictability. As the company starts growing, it is inevitable that the organization and optimization of processes will be essential to scale, and an evolution of management style is very much a part of that equation.

Combining agile management and top down management can bring out the best in both. Engaged teams can work with autonomy, and cross-organizational clarity on the direction of the company and this would allow successful transition from start-ups to sustainable business.

Management and staff meetings are venues where novel ideas are discussed and important decisions taken for their implementation. It is vital that such meetings and conferences are transcribed, preferably by utilizing digital transcription services. A professional business transcription team would assure accurate transcription, deliver the transcripts on time at competitive pricing, and also ensure that your files are safe.