Below is one of the best little videos featuring Seth Godin that you can find. The meat and potatoes of it (as it pertains to this post) is in the first 1:15. I know you have an extra minute and fifteen seconds, so please watch it.

The application of what he’s saying onto every aspect of the wine business is huge, and is the root cause not of the failure of many wholesalers or restaurants or retailers but rather of the stagnation of them.

A company or individual that thinks they are leading when actually they are managing is pouring concrete around the legs of their most powerful asset, their people.

The wholesaler that micro-manages their employees and tracks hours ahead of results … will lose the best and the brightest.

The restaurant that doesn’t respond and invest in the server that expresses interest in wine but confusion about to how learn it … will lose her when she finds a new employer who buys her a book about the subject or enrolls her in a class.

The retailer that tells their employees what to sell based only on profit margin … will lose that person when they realize they have a nose and an opinion.

Some great thinkers even take this a step further: you can’t actually manage people, you can only manage process.

Think about that.