In my experience, it's fear over ego. At the last company I worked for, the CEO discovered Marty Cagan and immediately switched the entire company over to following his recommendations. I was on a product team, and we came up with our own strategy to meet our OKRs. The CEO didn't like our approach, and decided that, actually, he was going to both set the objectives, and results, and tell us how to achieve them. We were basically a feature team.
But it wasn't ego, it was fear. The company was running out of runway, we just hadnt been told yet. The CEO adopted the product team strategy as a Hail Mary, out of sheer panic, and he sabotaged it for the exact same reason: he was terrified of not trying it, and then terrified of it not working.
Not only because of this anecdote, but because of several other important ones, I view leadership as being generally fear-driven in their decision making. Ducklike, they appear calm and even confident on the surface, while desperately thrashing and failing below the surface. Or, like someone falling down a hill and reaching out for anything to hold on to.
But it wasn't ego, it was fear. The company was running out of runway, we just hadnt been told yet. The CEO adopted the product team strategy as a Hail Mary, out of sheer panic, and he sabotaged it for the exact same reason: he was terrified of not trying it, and then terrified of it not working.
Not only because of this anecdote, but because of several other important ones, I view leadership as being generally fear-driven in their decision making. Ducklike, they appear calm and even confident on the surface, while desperately thrashing and failing below the surface. Or, like someone falling down a hill and reaching out for anything to hold on to.