Perry Timms Built a Self-Managed Enterprise - Yet Not Everyone Can Make That Kind of Work Work

I once read a book called Reinventing Organisations, and my life has never been the same since. I got really into self-managed, hierarchy-free organisations, the kind where people are trusted to think for themselves and get on with it instead of waiting for someone above them to say go. I became fascinated by organisations that just seem to run themselves, without one person at the top calling all the shots. No ego, no power moves, no “because I said so”. Just people working together, trying to do good work, for the greater good. Collaboratively, and while working to better themselves and the organisation at large.

To put it simply, self-managed teams have meaningful decision-making authority over how the work gets done. There is no manager or boss that makes those decisions for them. For example, in a traditional team, you’ll have a manager who decides priorities, allocates work, monitors performance, resolves problems if anything comes up, unblocks people, and manages the team. This is pretty much the world most of us come from. And compared to the following, it seems to be the easy way. In a self-managed team, on the other hand, the organisation only sets the broader purpose and boundaries, whereas all members of the team collaboratively decide how to organise itself and deliver the work. This includes who does what, how work is divided, when and where they work, what processes to use, how to solve problems, etc.

I ate these ideas up like nothing else. I thought, “This is it!” This is how all organisations should be. Give people the autonomy and freedom they need, and surely they’ll move mountains? Idealistic, I know, but it didn’t stop me from trying to find companies that managed to make this idealistic vision work in practice. And the more I read and researched, the more I realised that self-management is not, in fact, an easy feat. It’s difficult, it’s demanding, and it needs people who know what they’re doing. You can’t just throw a person who spent the last ten years in a traditional company into one and expect them to thrive in it. In fact, for an untrained person, it can be a much more difficult environment to stay in, especially if the organisation doesn’t provide a clear and structured way to navigate it.

I desperately wanted to speak with someone who knew exactly what self-management means in real life. This is how I found Perry Timms - a founder of PTHR, a deliberately small, self-managed consultancy working across organisation design, HR, agile ways of working and leadership. No managers, no hierarchy, just a handful of core people and a wider circle of collaborators.

On the outside, PTHR sounds like a good place to work as it’s packed with meaningful credentials, including: HR Most Influential Hall of Fame, Certified B Corporation, WorldBlu Freedom-Centred™, RenDanHeYi Top 50 Self-Managed, Gold-standard 4-day week, SME Climate Hub committed, and EMEA Top 50 Inspiring Workplace. But I know that perfection doesn’t exist, so I asked Perry the hard questions: what didn’t work, what was hard, and where they failed before they learned to be who they’re now. And thankfully, I didn't get a clean promo-style case study back. I got an honest, real attempt to explain what it actually means to be a self-managed organisation like them.

What the system actually looks like

PTHR organises their work across nine internal "stacks". Most of them run without Perry. Strategy is shared, though he keeps an avid interest in it. Finance still routes through him because someone has to sign things off and be accountable for the capital side of the business. Client delivery mostly routes through him as well, but only the key bits, and only because some clients specifically want him doing the work.

When I asked how AI changed their day-to-day, he confirmed that it gets folded into the same philosophy:

“Because we're using it to learn from us, take our learning deeper and further into areas we wouldn't otherwise have time for, and I'd say, it’s given us a distinct advantage over other consultancies who help others introduce AI. We absolutely know how best to sequence it into our work and create it as an extension of who we are and what we do and stand for. Our Polymorphic Organisation bot and our self-built website are a triumphant product/deliverable we'd only dreamed of before. We've built our own workspaces and tools and we are using it to bring to life more of our expansive ideas, more quickly and with more viability. We're also conscious that in order to advise best on the future, we have to be that. And I believe we are. In just under a year, we've become way more adept than others in our professional and chosen fields.”

The relief of not being needed

I asked Perry what it actually feels like not leading a team in the conventional sense. Whether stepping back is freeing or a little terrifying. He told me he doesn't want to manage people and doesn't see it as necessary, but he can't abide people coasting either:

“There are some things where I feel like I need to lead - because I'm representing our system's best interests, not because I'm "in charge". Not leading day-to-day is liberating for me. I don't want to manage people. I don't see it as necessary. But equally, I can't abide coasting, wasting time and what I call "faffing around".

There's so much exciting work that we're involved in. If people can't find anything of value, interest and stimulation with us, they're unlikely to ever find that anywhere. So why should I need to interfere with that? If people aren't honouring the system, though, the system needs me to intervene and check what's going on.”

I was also very curious to know how he knows when he’s succeeding in his role (which he calls Chief Energy Officer, by the way):

“People will tell me how pleased they are with what they did, or won't feel the need to explain delays or being stuck. I'm really happy to help people out if they need it, but I'm not there because people feel they shouldn't make a decision or that they daredn't. So I know I'm succeeding when:

(a) I don't have to decide on things;

(b) I don't have to check up on things and

(c) I can see what impact people are having through their work because of the way we do no work "in the dark" and do it all "out loud". When I'm not, it's the opposite, and people naturally don't show up anything of value in their work.”

I remembered reading Perry's old essay "Fakery," where he explained that management forces you to fake caring about your team equally, whether you actually do or not. This is where he argued for getting rid of that fakeness in how we manage, and for self-management as the alternative. So I asked him what exactly pushed him to build a company like PTHR, wondering if this might have been the reason. Here's what he actually said:

“I detested being supervised or micro-managed. I deplored leaders who didn't show appreciation for what I did and just checked up on my work. So when I had the chance to set up a company, I wanted it to be about adults taking responsibility and accountability for their work, and I could rely on them to work on their own steam, not "swing the lead", and be supportive and helpful to their teammates, not just "do their job". My best work was when I was given what I needed and left to get on with it. I wanted to see everyone have/do that.”

The part nobody puts in the impact report

Ask anyone running a company like this for the highlights, and you'll get a highlight reel and how happy and excited everyone is to be a part of the team. But I asked Perry the opposite. I wanted to know what was hard and what didn’t work. He didn’t hide the truth:

“Self-management isn't easy. People can be wasteful, misdirected because they confuse autonomy with "do what I want". Busy "theatre" has crept in time and again. Also, we're so open and participatory; some people took that as "I'm experienced, so what I say goes". We had to handle that sensitively but firmly.

At times, when the system needs a really sharp focus and personal workloads have to take second place, some people have said "they don't get it" or "I don't know how to do that kind of work" and shut down a bit. Others learn, try, experiment, step up, sense, and research. Our system is reliant on agency. Self-efficacy. Aligned autonomy. Not everyone saw it that way, and that's the dark side I think of any self-managed enterprise. Others deferred "up" despite me saying many times "don't make me the boss.

When we've had performance issues, that's been turned around as biased and punitive measures that aren't in keeping with our culture. That's abuse of our openness and trust. That has been hard: tackling people who "weaponise" things like psychological safety and recoil from any coaching attempts or overt and intentional direction-setting due to prioritisation miscueing.

We're far from perfect. Many people aren't working with us because they couldn't really hack that openness as much as they believed they could.”

And while I wished self-management was easier given how interested I was in it, it didn’t surprise me. We can see the exact same pattern anywhere we work. Give people enough freedom, and some will treasure it and do their best work, whereas others won't know what to do with it. Even worse, some will exploit and manipulate it for their own benefit.

So here’s what I think this tells us: self-management has the potential to make people flourish, but it’s not a guarantee. It kind of works like a mirror, showing you how people respond when they’re given a lot more freedom and responsibility. Some people will want to throw themselves into the work, figure things out for themselves, and keep pushing things forward, while others just want to have a job, do what’s expected of them, and leave the rest at the door. The latter doesn’t make a person bad or wrong; it simply shows that self-management would not help them thrive. Most of us have never been taught how to run and manage ourselves. We were taught how to follow rules, guidance, direction, and do as we’re told, so no wonder that such structural change would make some people feel absolutely lost. I asked Perry what he thinks separates the people who last at his company from the ones who don’t:

“Who thrives? Believers in the mission, principles and purpose AND who can turn that into fully autonomous, aligned, devoted application to the work that drives us forward. It's not enough to have a job here. It's also not an all-consuming "take" environment. We work at pace. We call it "dog years" because a week for us is 7x anyone else's working week. So we have to be on it. We don't do ritualistic corporate lumbering, we communicate in the open and we pull it towards us. Not knowing the current hot things is not good enough. We have engineered systems that enable people to choose their work but it has to be in pursuit of what matters most to the enterprise and the system, not just what's in your workstack or your own "flights of fancy".

We don't have jobs, we have "callings that masquerade as roles". We are so systematic but so open and adaptive. We learn and experiment all the time, but that's not indulgent; it's how we get better. We value deep knowledge and creativity. We are also a living paradox. Not either-or— both. Humanly and performance pro. Participatory and intentional. Experimental and rigorous.

Who doesn't thrive? People used to somewhat hiding in a "job". People who can't keep up. We are unapologetically pacy and rapid because we're so excited about our work, not because there are unreal demands. Being smart doesn't mean being arrogant or obtuse with it. We are open, we share, and if you don't do that, you don't fit.

We've had people really keen to add value, but they just can't work out how. And rely on others to show them what that could be. That's not autonomy; that's an overreliance. We work on an energy basis. If you don't have it - and that doesn't mean extroversion - you don't belong. We are vibrant and unorthodox. If you like steady and traditional, we're not for you.

We're so inclusive that being questioned about it is an affront. It's like breathing to us. We have always had lots of working parents (Mums) in our ranks and we know there's no better place to balance caring with work. All of our pace, knowledge, drive, and creativity is because we make sure people can look after the outside-of-work things. If you say "you don't have time because..." it's not our system, that's your choices limiting you. We're patient still, but that doesn't mean we're open-ended. Impact really matters to us. If you produce things because you can, not because they add value and take us beyond our current edges, that's not good enough for us. So we really are the nicest place to work, but also the most demanding yet rewarding. Some people like the former, not so much the latter. But we're not a social club. Our work is too important to us for that. Not in a blind faith way, but we have so much to do and offer; mediocrity, coasting, faffing around — just not an option.

And we don't like the phrase "make work more fun". It's too important for that. It can be energising, enjoyable, thrilling even. But in a desperately tough world, we want to fix all we can in work, and that is why we're so difficult to actually be a part of. People have come and gone. No malice — bar the odd sour turning. But mostly, it takes a very special, unique, and driven person to make it at PTHR. We're not brutal, but we are not for the faint-hearted.”

Reading this alone tells me that most people wouldn’t be able to handle this. You’ll need to come in already comfortable with self-management, decision-making, independent thinking, and self-direction. Add to that the fact that most companies actively discourage this, and it's no surprise most people have never built the skill set needed.

How the shape of the team changed

Now that we know who thrives and who doesn't, I wanted to understand how the shape of Perry’s team has changed throughout the years and why. He explained that they started as just him, then plus one, then plus two, eventually growing to eight people. Along the way, some people failed to live up to what the system asked of them. They’d experimented with all sorts of resourcing models, but still some people just couldn't make it work.

"It was sad in 2023 and then again in 2025. We had to either rely on honourable people stepping away or some being asked to leave the business, as there was no longer a fit and no chance of making it work after months (and years) of trying to do that. In the most sincere and non-accusatory way, some people prefer to be framed (or even "hide") behind a job. And when some don't have the capability to handle shifting to an autonomous, self-managed way, they take it as an insult. So shifting shape hasn't been easy. Not from a system point of view — we're adept at being polymorphic — so from a behavioural and emotional point of view, that's been hard. We're now the perfect size and model - 3 core people, and 8-10 aligned additional collaborators.”

I was curious about the conflict, too. How do self-managed teams deal with that?

“I don't mind frank exchanges of views or differing viewpoints. When I assert my view, people who see things differently often accuse me of reverting to hierarchical control and thus failing to uphold a self-management modality. When in reality that's been about people feeling they have to over-exert, and I'm balancing and calibrating that in favour of the system — not my own personal view — the system's needs.”

PTHR principles talk about “harmonising” rather than avoiding conflict. What does it mean in practice?

“Harmony is about finding what you genuinely need to work on, but the harmony is to preserve the positive nature of an adult-to-adult relationship. Not conflict to show how you can handle disagreement, but conflict underpinned by a sense, a desire, and a way of preserving overall harmony. Too many people think it's all conflict or there's no conflict. I prefer to see it that starting from a place of harmony can nullify the temptation to "dig in" and insist it becomes combative or obstinate.”

In other words, I think harmonising is about being able to hold a strong position or challenge someone while still understanding that you’re on the same side. You can strongly disagree and still care about what’s best for the organisation and the team. That feels particularly relevant in environments where you can’t expect your boss to step in and settle things for you. And I can see how useful this could be for quieter people, too, especially those of us who are more likely to hold back or let something go than push our position and risk getting into an argument.

The 4-day week

I’m a big fan of a 4-day week, so of course, I had to ask how this works at PTHR. Perry didn’t try to sell it as a perk; instead, he called it a quantum week:

“More gets done through less hours on the clock. We are rested, less tired, more focused, and we used this to brutally scrap unnecessary activities, meetings, and the usual "pollution" that you find in any business of any size.

What many people have gotten used to is that all this "work" isn't really that - it's rituals. "We must get together and discuss this". No, how about you create a thread in Slack, post your views and suggestions, we all go to that when we can, build on each other's comments, and eventually we are likely to arrive at the decision or creative input we needed just asynchronously.

That's the economics of a four-day week; start the whole work design again. It's also what AI and automation are doing now. So we were 20% more productive with the hours we had, effectively losing no business throughput but delivering across less actual time.”

How do you even know whether it works

This is where it gets even more interesting. I wanted to know how Perry knows that self-management actually works. He measures it, he told me, "by how we are being." He introduced the concept of Martin Heidegger's "Dasein" and turned it into an actual charter he socialised with the whole team and returned to whenever people drifted off course or misdirected their effort. Effectiveness itself, they measure it against Professor Colin Mayer's Six Lenses of Prosperity: human, social, intellectual, material, natural, and financial value, rather than a single output number that pretends to capture whether people are thriving.

They also use a tool called “Clockify” that tracks where they spend their time to see how much of it is on internal or revenue-bearing/creating activities.

“We were so disproportionately internal we had to address this. At some point I was doing 90% of the delivery work and 99% of the inbound creation — we had to change that. So we do have some pretty good measures, just not "performance theatre" or predictable ones — more sophisticated and holistic, I'd say.”

But there is something he still can’t let go of. When I asked what’s hardest for him to accept about running things this way, his answer got really raw and personal:

“Honestly, the disappointment in people who don't make it this way. I can't let go of that. Even one of our team did an MSc and concluded that not everyone can work in a self-managed environment. I simply can't fathom that. We're born with dependency; I get that. But as discerning adults, I've researched the science that says it's natural in the vast majority of mature adults to seek autonomy, meaning, connections, mastery, and self-authorship. Even taking into account the most advanced neuro-diversity research, we are more capable of directing ourselves than we've been "taught" to. So that, I can't let go of.”

If you're thinking of building something similar

I asked Perry what the most common mistake is for anyone looking at PTHR and wanting to build their own version of it. He said, “to have one string to your bow”. And as someone who is equally passionate about multiple things and has always struggled with the idea of picking just one niche, I loved hearing someone else essentially give me permission not to. You can have a clear thing you stand for without having to squeeze everything you can do into one neat little box.

“Some people advise you to have a signature thing - like being a speaking coach, or a team-building facilitator, or a psychometric tool user. I'd say that's self-limiting. You're then purely defined by your one trick.

A coach specialising in, but also adept in A and B, is much more likely to appeal to a range of client needs. Anyway, don't be too confusing about what you can do, but don't be "elevator pitch" only. I do everything from coaching, to Organisation Design, to Agile, to HR team capability, to leadership strategy days, to workforce planning, to talent development programmes, to Operating Models, to self-managed systems of work, to public speaking.

So don't be and do one thing, stand for and be something important that is the one thing and have a repertoire underneath that to meet client needs.”

I eventually arrived at a very similar conclusion myself: find the problem you deeply care about solving, and allow the solutions to take whatever shape they need to take.

But the other thing I found interesting was what he said when I asked what clients actually ask him for most often. His answer wasn't about culture, self-management, or any of the language that I came to associate with Perry and PTHR:

“The most common ask for me, is enhancing the performance and impact of HR teams. They are often the most underutilised resource and expertise in any organisation. I love helping unleash them.”

To close the interview, I asked what he'd most want a complete case study of PTHR to show. His answer was the least practical thing he told me, and also the most inspiring:

“A complete case study of PTHR is one of emergence, energy, and eudaimonia. That's it. We live to build flourishing enterprises, teams, individuals, and therefore help create flourishing lives that are in harmony with a flourishing society, communities, and planet. It's that big. We don't want to put a dent in the universe (famous Steve Jobs quote), we want to smooth out the creases in the universe.”

And these words pretty much sum up what I aspire to do, too.

The question I ended up asking instead

Self-management might actually be less about the organisational design itself and more about the people inside it. Do they already have the capabilities they need to thrive in that kind of environment? If not, are they willing to build them? I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about how to structure organisations, and talking to Perry reminded me that structure is only half the battle. The other half is whether the people stepping into it are ready for what that structure requires.

And I don’t mean that we need to blame the people when a system fails them. Just like different structures will suit different organisations, they’ll suit different people differently, too. Most of us have spent years being rewarded for following the rules, sticking to processes, and looking to someone else for direction, so we can’t really expect to walk into an environment that suddenly gives us all this autonomy and responsibility and just know what to do with it. Those are things we have to learn, too.

PTHR has had people leave because the model wasn’t right for them. Perry told me that some of those situations were difficult, particularly when people had genuinely tried to make it work. So the biggest reality check for me was that self-management might not work for everyone. Perry was very open about that. The freedom that sounds so appealing can also feel very uncomfortable because there is nowhere to hand responsibility over to. When something doesn’t work in a traditional organisation, there are often structures, managers, or processes you can point to, but in a self-managed organisation, almost all of that responsibility sits with you.

Which brings me back to another thing I’ve been flirting around with for a while now: the self and the organisation are the same design problem, just at different zoom levels. You can build the most intelligently designed, trust-based, hierarchy-free organisation in the world, but it still won’t work if the people inside it don’t know what to do with all that trust.

When I started the interview, I wanted to know whether self-management actually works, and how. Now I have a slightly different question: could I actually work this way?

Thanks for reading!

Lina