Philip A. Ritson and Lee D. Parker
This paper aims to examine the employment of the military metaphor by the management thinker and writer Lyndall Urwick who in the twentieth century developed and articulated his…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to examine the employment of the military metaphor by the management thinker and writer Lyndall Urwick who in the twentieth century developed and articulated his ideas over a 60-year period, arguably the longest continuous period of any management writer of his day.
Design/methodology/approach
This study draws on published research into Urwick as well as upon the breadth of his published writings over a 60-year period. It offers a contextualised explanatory analysis of his military theory ideas and explores their lack of traction by reference to British military, economic and social history.
Findings
The study reveals the wartime context that surrounded the emergence of his ideas and motivated Urwick’s faith in the military approach to management. This stood in contrast to the countervailing forces of the post-war decline in British industry and a populist mythology of British Army mismanagement and failure in the Great War.
Originality/value
In this case of a management idea’s failure to gain traction, the importance of the congruence between management theory and societal beliefs emerges as crucial to the likely uptake of new management thinking.
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Lee D. Parker and Philip Ritson
The purpose of this paper is to analyse and critique Lyndall Urwick's long‐term advocacy of scientific management and its influence upon management thought.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to analyse and critique Lyndall Urwick's long‐term advocacy of scientific management and its influence upon management thought.
Design/methodology/approach
An analysis and critique of Urwick's published writings across 60 years, on the subject of scientific management and organizations, particularly linking his work and arguments to the influence of Frederick Taylor, also positioning him relative to the thinking of leading thinkers such as Henri Fayol.
Findings
This paper argues that the key to understanding his legacy lies in his unique and changing definition of “scientific management”. This was broader than the definition applied by most of his contemporaries and inspired his integrationist project of assimilating Taylorist scientific management into a raft of developing schools of management thought.
Research limitations/implications
Urwick's legacy included a lifetime campaign to reconcile scientific management with succeeding schools of thought, today's management literature stereotyping of some of his contemporary thinkers, and a contribution to management literature's predilection for the labelling of theories and principles.
Practical implications
The paper argues for returning to original sources to accurately understand the intentions and arguments of early founders of many aspects of today's management practice. It also alerts us to the proclivity of management theory and practice to opt for convenient labels that may represent a variety of historical and contemporary meanings.
Originality/value
The paper offers a critical reflection and assessment of the longest standing advocate of scientific management in the management literature.
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Lee D. Parker and Philip Ritson
The management profession has a long and well‐documented history adopting and abandoning “fads” promulgated by a series of thinkers, practitioners, and opinion leaders who enjoy a…
Abstract
Purpose
The management profession has a long and well‐documented history adopting and abandoning “fads” promulgated by a series of thinkers, practitioners, and opinion leaders who enjoy a “guru” like status. The purpose of this paper shows that stereotyping contributes to the existence of this guru‐fad phenomenon.
Design/methodology/approach
The paper examines the characteristics of both management fads and the phenomenon of stereotyping with reference to two leading historical management practitioners and thinkers, Henri Fayol and Mary Parker Follett.
Findings
Drawing on the examples of Mary Parker Follett and Henri Fayol, it argues that the influence exerted by other management gurus and fads, such as Frederick Winslow Taylor's Scientific Management and Elton Mayo's Human Relations Movement, gave rise to a stereotyped view of both Follett and Fayol's work that prevented an accurate appraisal of their ideas.
Research limitations/implications
In addition, this paper notes that, while Follett and Fayol exhibited an extraordinary capacity to identify the very issues that have spawned many subsequent management fads, the contemporary management discipline's approach to both thinkers is quite different. While Follett has escaped her earlier stereotypes, allowing management thinkers a new opportunity to re‐assess her work and value its contemporary relevance, Fayol remains misclassified as a European Taylorist who has little to offer the contemporary management practitioner.
Originality/value
This paper provides an interesting insight into the characteristics of both management fads and the phenomenon of stereotyping.
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Logan M. Steele, Tristan McIntosh, Tyler J. Mulhearn, Logan L. Watts, Heather J. Anderson, Desiree Hill, Li Lin, Samuel H. Matthews, Alisha M. Ness and M. Ronald Buckley
This paper aims to provide a review of the reinstitution of the Journal of Management History (JMH) following its five-year merger with Management Decision. In this review, the…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to provide a review of the reinstitution of the Journal of Management History (JMH) following its five-year merger with Management Decision. In this review, the final issue of the merger in 2005 is examined through the four volumes of JMH that were published after the separation. Across this time period, trends in topics and approaches, as well as identify particularly impactful work, were investigated.
Design/methodology/approach
With a taxonomy developed in a previous review of JMH (Hardy et al., 2015), articles were sorted by independent raters for the following dimensions: focus (i.e. person, topic or event), historical approach (i.e. an account or analysis) and readership (i.e. public policy or management). After full consensus was reached, these categories were examined to identify themes and shifts in trends over the target time period. Finally, the impact of articles published between 2005 and 2009 was evaluated by using citations provided by Google Scholar.
Findings
In the years following the separation of JMH from Management Decision, a few notable shifts were observed in the journal’s focus, approach and readership. This time period was first characterized by a heavy emphasis on topic-based articles. The emphasis subsequently shifted to strike a balance between focusing on people and topics. There was also fairly balanced use of historical analysis and historical account approaches. The final shift led to a majority of articles having a person-based focus. Interestingly, the largest impacts were made all by articles with a focus on particular management topic.
Originality/value
This quantitative review provides insight into the development of JMH following its reestablishment as independent publication outlet.
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LET'S VARY LITERACEE with a little bibliographic burglaree. If you suddenly feel like humming The Pirates of Penzance or recollecting Gilbert and Sullivan, you are closely attuned…
Abstract
LET'S VARY LITERACEE with a little bibliographic burglaree. If you suddenly feel like humming The Pirates of Penzance or recollecting Gilbert and Sullivan, you are closely attuned to the bibliographic thoughts in my mind. Literary allusions are the rich overtones that make reading and writing a grand collaboration and a happy pursuit. An author may conscientiously write to convey ideas, but if a cut above the average, he always strives as did H. L. Mencken to express his ideas ‘in suave and ingratiating terms, and to discharge them with a flourish, and maybe with a phrase of pretty song’. His creative efforts will be mostly wasted, however, if his readers lack the requisite literary background and sophistication that would enable them to join in his game and share his earnest effusions. Literacy is never enough; a young child can read and understand the six one‐syllable words ‘who steals my purse, steals trash’, but that same child can grow to be a mighty old man without ever fully comprehending the sentence unless he reads Othello and studies Iago's presumptuous remarks on ‘Good name in man and woman’.
The fundamental problem of designing a wide scope general revenue tax can be reduced to the selection of the base used for administering the tax. Our current personal income tax…
Abstract
The fundamental problem of designing a wide scope general revenue tax can be reduced to the selection of the base used for administering the tax. Our current personal income tax is a hybrid version of a tax assessed on the basis of a tax unit's annual income receipts. An alternative to an income‐based tax that has received much theoretical treatment but little actual application is an expenditure‐based tax. An expenditure tax (also called a consumption tax or cash flow tax in the context of this paper) differs from an income tax in that it exempts net saving and investment from the tax base. Though the details of a consumption tax design are discussed more fully elsewhere in this paper, the tax base of an expenditure tax is roughly determined by subtracting net savings from gross receipts (including wages, tips, salaries, income from investments, interests, etc.). Withdrawals from savings constitute dissavings and are appropriately included in net savings. The cash flow tax, with wealth transfers deductible to the donor and included in the tax base of the recipient, would be a tax on an individual's standard of living. Similar to the present income tax standard deduction, some universal credit or exemption for a small level of consumption could be allowed.
– The purpose of this paper is to identify and analyze the topics published in the journal in the five-year period from 2005 to 2009.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to identify and analyze the topics published in the journal in the five-year period from 2005 to 2009.
Design/methodology/approach
A qualitative examination of content by year identifies prevalent themes.
Findings
The beginning and ending of the time period demonstrate continued interest in major figures of our field and the context of their thinking. Quality, excellence and continuous improvement were recurrent topics as were those of business in society, ethics and social responsibility. The value of historical analysis with suggested methodologies for further study was included.
Research limitations/implications
The paper is limited to the topical papers within this five-year timeframe and a qualitative analysis of themes. Fewer than expected papers were published on leadership and international subjects given their important to the field.
Practical implications
Aspiring authors may find the historical background for the current topics of entrepreneurship, quality, ethics and social responsibility convenient. Helpful advice from experts about how to study management history is highlighted. Cross-cultural and international historical linkages on themes and concepts are identified as areas in need of additional research.
Social implications
The social construction of studying and teaching history is discussed. The context in which major writers lived and events occurred is recognized as a major factor in interpreting situations.
Originality/value
The paper reviews over 100 articles to categorize the historical origins of current and recurring topics into major themes. Papers are organized by topic, person or event into a chart by year.
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Sarah Pearson and Patrick Barwise
The purpose of this paper is to understand the use of the personal video recorder (PVR) in the home and the impact on TV advertising exposure.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to understand the use of the personal video recorder (PVR) in the home and the impact on TV advertising exposure.
Design/methodology/approach
A video ethnographic study of 22 participants in eight homes with PVRs.
Findings
Use of the PVR differed widely between and within homes but of the 22 individuals, 21 used the PVR – if at all, as a backup when there was nothing on that they wanted to watch live. Consequently, of 3,480 individual opportunities to see commercials during the study, Only 30 per cent were time‐shifted and 70 per cent viewed live. Even for the 30 per cent of commercials that were time‐shifted, there was variable but significant ad exposure. This paper suggests that in combination with other, complementary studies, the impact of PVRs on advertising exposure will be limited.
Research limitations/implications
Many respondents perceived themselves as using the PVR much more than they actually did and claimed to have zero exposure to commercials when they watched time‐shifted programmes. In line with previous research, this shows that claimed behaviour is not reliable and it is important to observe actual behaviour in the natural context in order to understand future use of technology. As with all qualitative research the main limitation of this study is the small sample size. In practice, however, the results were very consistent with comparable results from the two main quantitative sources BARB and the Sky + panel. What our methodology provides, which quantitative methods cannot, is breadth and richness of insight into actual consumer behaviour in a natural context. The two methods are consistent and complementary. Further research could be improved if it was longitudinal and focused on the motivations to use and value of use of PVR and other emerging technologies, e.g. video on demand, internet protocol television and mobile TV.
Originality/value
The paper highlights the necessity of observing actual behaviour in order to gain an accurate understanding of the impact of new technologies on behaviour.
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Amber M. Epp and Linda L. Price
Macro-social disruptions and evolutions open up new possibilities for feeding the family. This paper aims to review prior constraints imposed by the gendered history of care work…
Abstract
Purpose
Macro-social disruptions and evolutions open up new possibilities for feeding the family. This paper aims to review prior constraints imposed by the gendered history of care work as part of the moral economy, with particular focus on how food traditions and routines reproduce family relations.
Design/methodology/approach
An assemblage perspective provides an appropriate theoretical lens to trace such emergent reconfigurations.
Findings
The paper takes as its focus three macro shifts with the potential to incite more and less intentional changes to the realities of feeding the family: changes in home life and organization of care, dads’ participation in feeding the family and innovation in food systems.
Research limitations/implications
Theoretical contributions reveal how shifting macro-social structures constrain and shape trajectories for the work of feeding the family.
Practical implications
Practical implications focus on how creative family members, marketers and policymakers influence arrangements, capacities and practices of family life.
Originality/value
This commentary brings an assemblage view of family life that proposes potential lines of flight when considering macro-context shifts, with particular attention to the relationship between food and family.