Leadership | Feb 6

How to shift between micro- and macro-management without undermining productivity

Leadership | Feb 6

How leaders can balance autonomy, structure, and productivity as their teams grow

Ian Wylie Journalist, broadcaster, educator

Reading Time 5 minutes

Ask a room full of small business leaders where they spend most of their time and you might hear a common dilemma. Too close to the detail and you’re accused of micromanaging. Too far away and things start to wobble. The real challenge isn’t choosing one style over the other. It’s knowing when to zoom in and when to zoom out, without slowing the business down or frustrating the team.

Recent research co-authored by Professor Mark Hart, advisor to the Help to Grow: Management Course, on SME leadership and productivity suggests that this ability to switch modes matters more than leaders often realise. Studies consistently show that businesses perform better when leaders create space for autonomy and innovation, but only when that freedom sits inside clear structures, expectations, and communication. Empowerment works best when it’s intentional.

Empowerment doesn’t mean absence

That balance is something that Tess Taylor, director of Oxford-based social enterprise Tap Social and Help to Grow: Management alumna, says she thinks about constantly. She describes herself as ‘definitely a macro manager’, someone who prefers to give people room rather than hover over their shoulder.

‘I think it’s really important to give people the opportunity to thrive and grow independently,’ she says, ‘without someone overseeing every move or approving or challenging their work at each stage.’

For Taylor, stepping back isn’t about being distant. It’s about trust. She believes putting responsibility into people’s hands ‘breeds creativity, builds leaders, and allows individuals to develop their own problem-solving skills’. That sense of ownership matters. People feel proud of what they’re building because they know how much input they’ve had into making it happen.

Give trust structure

Day-to-day, that means that Taylor says she’s accessible rather than omnipresent. Team members are encouraged to bring questions and ideas to her, but with the understanding that they don’t need sign-off on everything. ‘They have the autonomy to make decisions and crack on,’ she says, ‘knowing that I’ll back their efforts and be there for support.’

Crucially, this kind of macro leadership doesn’t run on goodwill alone. It needs structure. As Tap Social has grown, Taylor has deliberately put clearer line management in place so people know who they report to, and who their manager reports to. There’s accountability without constant checking. ‘There’s a line of responsibility that means people are empowered to do their job without a need to be micromanaged,’ she explains, unless closer involvement is genuinely helpful for development or hitting specific goals.

Communication does a lot of the heavy lifting. Regular check-ins with managers, open channels for questions and company-wide updates help keep everyone aligned. Tap Social sends regular emails with updates from across the business, recognition for exceptional performance and visibility on what’s coming next. The aim, says Taylor, is to make sure people feel informed and included, even as responsibility is pushed outwards.

That awkward middle stage

This approach reflects something researchers see again and again: leaders who stay macro don’t disappear. They design the environment others work in.

That design challenge becomes sharper as businesses grow, says Lynn Oxborrow, Professor in Sustainable Small Business Growth at Nottingham Business School. From her work with SMEs on programmes such as the Help to Grow: Management Course, she sees leadership as a series of transitions rather than a single shift.

‘The founder or leader goes through several transitions as the business, and specifically the team, grows,’ she says. Early on, leaders are doing the job they trained for. Later, they have to accept spending less time on that work and more time on strategy and people… or bring in others who know more than they do about running the business.

There’s a particularly awkward middle phase, often when businesses reach 20 to 50 employees in size. At this point, Oxborrow says, leaders frequently try to do everything for too long. The instinct to stay hands-on is understandable, especially in service businesses where customers or clients expect direct access to the founder’s expertise. But it often creates friction. Leaders aren’t just learning how to lead; they’re also having to help clients and staff trust that others in the organisation can deliver.

Leaders who can’t step back

In some cases, the problems creep up slowly. In others, they arrive with a jolt. Oxborrow points to examples where rapid growth exposed underlying issues that leaders hadn’t spotted, something she says is particularly common in family businesses. Productivity can suffer when decision-making is too centralised, innovation stalls, or staff disengage because they feel over-ruled or under-used.

One of the biggest casualties, she says, is staff development. ‘Not allowing other managers to operate to their full potential is one of the main problems,’ she says. People lose confidence, stop taking initiative, or simply leave. A coaching approach, she argues, works far better, giving people space to make decisions and learn from mistakes, rather than correcting everything from above.

Letting go isn’t easy. It involves ‘losing control and learning to trust’, even if the process is gradual and collaborative. But there are upsides beyond productivity: stronger leadership pipelines, better engagement, and businesses that are more attractive to investors, customers, and future leaders.

Finding your rhythm

The most effective SME leaders don’t sit permanently in micro or macro mode. They move between them deliberately, using structure, communication, and coaching to stay connected without becoming a bottleneck. You don’t have to choose one mode and stick to it. What matters is knowing when to lean in, when to step back… and building a business that can cope when you do.

Ian Wylie Journalist, broadcaster, educator

Ian Wylie is a journalist, editor, and broadcaster for the Financial Times, Guardian, BBC, Monocle, and others. For 16 years he was a staff writer, feature writer, and section editor at The Guardian newspaper. He also teaches on Newcastle University’s undergraduate and postgraduate journalism programmes.

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