Animals have hierarchies, too. Humans are different by having two types of hierarchies: dominance (based on strength, powered by fear) and prestige (based on skills, powered by admiration).
In childhood, parents play both roles: they punish you for disobeying rules, and they care about you and teach you all kinds of stuff. They exceed you in both strength and skills. But later, these two things separate: there are people you fear but don't admire, and people you admire but don't fear; people whose attention you want to avoid, and people whose attention you dream about.
In the workplace, there are people whom you admire for their skills, and then there are people who are simply given power over you without doing anything admirable. And there are also a few people who are given the power and who use it in an admirable way. I guess the idea is that we should get rid of people who are given power but do not have natural respect. The people who have both the power and respect... dunno, maybe their power should become informal, based on the consent of the governed (i.e. you follow their advice, because their advice consistently turns out to be good). Thus the bearers of "institutional memory" would stay, and the useless ones would go. Some teams would have one authority person, other teams would have multiple authorities with different responsibilities based on their skills.
In childhood, parents play both roles: they punish you for disobeying rules, and they care about you and teach you all kinds of stuff. They exceed you in both strength and skills. But later, these two things separate: there are people you fear but don't admire, and people you admire but don't fear; people whose attention you want to avoid, and people whose attention you dream about.
In the workplace, there are people whom you admire for their skills, and then there are people who are simply given power over you without doing anything admirable. And there are also a few people who are given the power and who use it in an admirable way. I guess the idea is that we should get rid of people who are given power but do not have natural respect. The people who have both the power and respect... dunno, maybe their power should become informal, based on the consent of the governed (i.e. you follow their advice, because their advice consistently turns out to be good). Thus the bearers of "institutional memory" would stay, and the useless ones would go. Some teams would have one authority person, other teams would have multiple authorities with different responsibilities based on their skills.