Mankind’s greatest invention is the organization.
Organizations allow individuals to contribute to accomplishments FAR beyond what any individual could do. This is the multiplication power.
Organizations also consume a “tax” from participants. There are certain kinds of overhead and administration costs. This is the subtraction function.
Leaders navigate in this landscape. Great leaders find ways to amplify the multiplication power while accepting some required subtraction. Great leaders focus and re-focus people’s attention on the multiplication result and train people to manage the subtraction.
