Invert the pyramid.
Hierarchy is indeed a natural phenomenon that emerges from organising anything. The question is how to construct the hierarchy. It is not necessary for it to centralise power at the top, nor grant positions in it by central fiat. It doesn’t have to sit on top of the value work as a burden: we say “flip the hierarchy”. Instead of drawing a conventional hierarchical org-chart going up to the CEO, we like to draw the flow of work with a tree going down to the CEO as a supporting structure under the value-work.
Managers are servants of the real work. The management hierarchy should sit under the value flow as a supporting structure. It all rests on the apex executive – they take the weight, not the workers. Management is not a weight on top of the work, it is a foundation below it. Management don’t add load to the work, they take it away. They don’t make value work harder, they make it easier. They get out of the way. They become servant managers. Management realise who the really important people are – who creates the value.
The power dynamics of conventional management are baked into our social thinking. We have to invert our own personal values and principles in order to learn the humility of servant management. We have to let go of egotistical affection for power, and the damaging myth that authority means superiority.
Note: there is no point being anti-hierarchy. The hierarchy is a natural structure that emerges often in nature. It’s how we think about the hierarchy that matters. Flip it.