# Management and autonomy are not diametrically opposed Management certainly does involve control, so it’s reasonable to think that if there is management going on, there is also autonomy being constrained. Control is more like one of the knobs that a manager can vary — it’s one piece of management and often the correct place to set it is close to zero. Robert Oppenheimer was Einstein’s manager at the Institute for Advanced Study. Did Oppenheimer tell Einstein what to do in any way? Of course not. He was fucking Einstein. Good managers often give people who do well with autonomy a ton of it. You might say that these managers aren’t actually managing! But they are for the simple reason that giving the autonomy is a *choice* they’re making. Management *does* mean that there is always the *potential* to constrain autonomy. However, that potential exists in any situation where someone needs more resources to accomplish their goals than they control directly. [[Management exists either implicitly or explicitly whenever there is coordination or power dynamics around research]] [Web URL for this note](http://notes.benjaminreinhardt.com/Management+and+autonomy+are+not+diametrically+opposed) [Comment on this note](http://via.hypothes.is/http://notes.benjaminreinhardt.com/Management+and+autonomy+are+not+diametrically+opposed)