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New models for a new age

THE CONCEPT of management has gradually become corrupted over the last 100 years, sparking a need for some major rethinking of management models in the modern world, argues Julian Birkinshaw in his latest book Reinventing Management.

Citing recent management crises in companies such as Lehman Brothers and General Motors, Birkinshaw – a Professor of Strategic and International Management at the London Business School – traces the rot to the success of large industrial companies and their particular management model as well as the popularity of the concept of leadership at the expense of management.

Accordingly, as large industrial firms rose to dominance, they created formal structures, processes and hierarchical systems of control – which we still recognise today – geared toward efficient, low-cost production of standardised products. While this management model was successful in the 20th century, it has blinded companies from pursuing alternative models. For example, sports teams or community organisations have different management principles that are potentially useful to companies.

Fuelling the rot has been the aggrandisement of leadership at the expense of management when the emphasis should have been on both. In Birkinshaw’s view, leadership is a process of social influence, concerned with the traits, styles and behaviours of individuals that cause others to follow them, while management is the act of getting people together to accomplish desired goals. Leadership and management complement one another, requiring us to be both leaders and managers, says Birkinshaw. 
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