(2025-07-31) Denning Warning To All Managers Your Job Is Becoming Obsolete

Steve Denning: Warning To All Managers: Your Job Is Becoming Obsolete. In 1882, Arthur Conan Doyle published a story about the mysterious disappearance of a famous racehorse and the murder of the horse’s trainer. No one could figure it out until the fictional detective Sherlock Homes pointed out that none of the witnesses had heard the watchdog bark during the night. This negative fact showed that criminal must have been someone the dog recognized.

Negative facts can also be important in business. Take last week’s vision statement by CEO Satya Nadella’s to Microsoft’s staff in which he presented comprehensive vision of the why, the now, and the what of this giant corporation’s future. Ask yourself what was a key negative fact about the statement?

Nadella’s brilliant vision of Microsoft’s future included “people,” “colleagues,” “teammates,” “friends,” “researchers,” analysts,” “teams,” “individuals,” “individuals,” “customers,” but no “managers.”

Amazon Wants Builders and Owners, Fewer Managers
"We started our cloud-computing business, Amazon Web Services, with about 13 employees. With a small number of people, you can build something that resonates with customers and then keep iterating from there." (network of competence)