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Shifting issues and paradigm rediscovery
THE EDITOR
Shifting Paradigm
Issues and Rediscove y
Editorial
There is no question about the urgency of the search being pursued by European Managers to try to restore the Continent’s manufacturing effectiveness. Managers of every country from the Soviet Union to Portugal and Ireland are engaged in an accelerating process of reorganization, and a search for acceptable principles to guide this activity. We have evolved a bewildering kaleidoscope of words and phrases which had barely been heard of a decade ago, but which are now the verbal currency with which we describe the new processes and the new discussions surrounding them. We talk about the restoration of enterprise cultures. We seek greater operational effectiveness. We are concerned with transnational mergers and cross cultural management. We know that we are at the infancy of the information technology age. New vocabulary which recently would have been regarded as bizarre jargon, being coined to describe the tasks of management in coping with opportunities and challenges of a complexity undreamt of ten years ago. The big issues have been starkly identified - political and linguistic divisions, a declining manufacturing base and a relative stagnation of economic performance. Our search for solutions embraces every level from the European Community to the micro chip. What seems to be happening is that we are becoming increasingly conscious of wider and wider sets of issues affecting the long term viability of European industry and commerce, and through these the whole fabric of European society. It does seem that we should be bringing into the management analysis process a wider set of paradigms than
lntroductio?z
have conventionally been brought together. Competitive success is not necessarily always measured in terms of profitability. Brilliant engineering and technological advance does not necessarily result in the desired sales volume. The enterprise culture is likely not to be the most effective basis for operating a hospital or an airport. The costs of returning a sense of fulfilment and work enrichment to workers may well render a whole process hopelessly uncompetitive in commercial terms. We can play these loop games with paradigms nd iufinitunz. The crucial question facing managers is how to drive them towards action, rather than letting them subside into a Euro-political morass. In this issue, Helmut Schmidt offers a vivid analysis of the background issues of the European political dimension, tying it down to a very personal statement. We also have a view of the United States, expressed by Thomas Horton, President and Chief Executive Officer of the American Management Association which expresses disquiet, from the American perspective, at the extent to which we Europeans still have to overcome our political complexities in order to let purposeful management get on with the business of creating successful organizations. We are used to reading about what Japan may mean to us, and recently there has been an upsurge of interest in Chinese management. Max Boisot, from L’Ecole Superieure de Commerce de Paris in his article, “Managing with Chinese Characteristics,” uses the well known 2 x 2 matrix to analyse China’s development strategy. This article represents a substantial advance on most of the travellers tales
150 THE EDITOR
which have been coming out of China recently. Rita Martenson directs our attention to the issues involved in competing in cross cultural environments, and in particular she draws attention to the problems of firms which are unlikely to be able to succeed in the race to become global, but nevertheless should be competitively successful in a different way. The meaningfulness of work is discussed by George England in an article which describes the MOW study comparing the centrality of work to workers’ lives in Germany, the USA and Japan. Another dimension of the interaction between the organization and the individual is covered in Phillip Judkins’ analysis of the study on networking for which he was responsible in Rank Xerox. Managing in the individual context is discussed by Professor Paddy Miller from the Instituto de Estudios Superiores de la Empresa in Barcelona, stressing the importance of the individual managerial presence in the workplace. He uses important sociological variables to analyse this phenomenon. To retrieve an enterprise culture there have been numerous experiments in most European countries and Professor Colin Gallagher of the Newcastle University reviews for us some of the salient
literature in this field. Lest we be seen to be becoming overly swayed by the human dimension, we conclude this issue with two more quantitatively technical articles. David Gelber, Executive Director of Chemical Bank International explores the alternatives between currency swap and forward exchange transactions. This lifts a comer of the veil which obscures much esoteric financial transaction language. It is also clear that much managerial behaviour is influenced by forecasts, and Robert Love of Sheffield City Polytechnic offers us an analysis of the quality of results of managerially based forecasts in a number of European countries. We are also pursuing the policy of developing the scope and coverage of the Journal to offer greater service to a senior European managerial readership. Therefore, in addition to our digest of the most managerially important Community developments, in this issue for the first time we introduce a set of book reviews, which are designed to tell executives why they should, or should not read one of the myriad of books now aimed at the management market. We intend to pursue a policy of increasing the information features content of the Journal as a service to readers. Next year we shall be moving to Quarterly publication.
Shifting Paradigm
Issues and Rediscove y
Editorial
There is no question about the urgency of the search being pursued by European Managers to try to restore the Continent’s manufacturing effectiveness. Managers of every country from the Soviet Union to Portugal and Ireland are engaged in an accelerating process of reorganization, and a search for acceptable principles to guide this activity. We have evolved a bewildering kaleidoscope of words and phrases which had barely been heard of a decade ago, but which are now the verbal currency with which we describe the new processes and the new discussions surrounding them. We talk about the restoration of enterprise cultures. We seek greater operational effectiveness. We are concerned with transnational mergers and cross cultural management. We know that we are at the infancy of the information technology age. New vocabulary which recently would have been regarded as bizarre jargon, being coined to describe the tasks of management in coping with opportunities and challenges of a complexity undreamt of ten years ago. The big issues have been starkly identified - political and linguistic divisions, a declining manufacturing base and a relative stagnation of economic performance. Our search for solutions embraces every level from the European Community to the micro chip. What seems to be happening is that we are becoming increasingly conscious of wider and wider sets of issues affecting the long term viability of European industry and commerce, and through these the whole fabric of European society. It does seem that we should be bringing into the management analysis process a wider set of paradigms than
lntroductio?z
have conventionally been brought together. Competitive success is not necessarily always measured in terms of profitability. Brilliant engineering and technological advance does not necessarily result in the desired sales volume. The enterprise culture is likely not to be the most effective basis for operating a hospital or an airport. The costs of returning a sense of fulfilment and work enrichment to workers may well render a whole process hopelessly uncompetitive in commercial terms. We can play these loop games with paradigms nd iufinitunz. The crucial question facing managers is how to drive them towards action, rather than letting them subside into a Euro-political morass. In this issue, Helmut Schmidt offers a vivid analysis of the background issues of the European political dimension, tying it down to a very personal statement. We also have a view of the United States, expressed by Thomas Horton, President and Chief Executive Officer of the American Management Association which expresses disquiet, from the American perspective, at the extent to which we Europeans still have to overcome our political complexities in order to let purposeful management get on with the business of creating successful organizations. We are used to reading about what Japan may mean to us, and recently there has been an upsurge of interest in Chinese management. Max Boisot, from L’Ecole Superieure de Commerce de Paris in his article, “Managing with Chinese Characteristics,” uses the well known 2 x 2 matrix to analyse China’s development strategy. This article represents a substantial advance on most of the travellers tales
150 THE EDITOR
which have been coming out of China recently. Rita Martenson directs our attention to the issues involved in competing in cross cultural environments, and in particular she draws attention to the problems of firms which are unlikely to be able to succeed in the race to become global, but nevertheless should be competitively successful in a different way. The meaningfulness of work is discussed by George England in an article which describes the MOW study comparing the centrality of work to workers’ lives in Germany, the USA and Japan. Another dimension of the interaction between the organization and the individual is covered in Phillip Judkins’ analysis of the study on networking for which he was responsible in Rank Xerox. Managing in the individual context is discussed by Professor Paddy Miller from the Instituto de Estudios Superiores de la Empresa in Barcelona, stressing the importance of the individual managerial presence in the workplace. He uses important sociological variables to analyse this phenomenon. To retrieve an enterprise culture there have been numerous experiments in most European countries and Professor Colin Gallagher of the Newcastle University reviews for us some of the salient
literature in this field. Lest we be seen to be becoming overly swayed by the human dimension, we conclude this issue with two more quantitatively technical articles. David Gelber, Executive Director of Chemical Bank International explores the alternatives between currency swap and forward exchange transactions. This lifts a comer of the veil which obscures much esoteric financial transaction language. It is also clear that much managerial behaviour is influenced by forecasts, and Robert Love of Sheffield City Polytechnic offers us an analysis of the quality of results of managerially based forecasts in a number of European countries. We are also pursuing the policy of developing the scope and coverage of the Journal to offer greater service to a senior European managerial readership. Therefore, in addition to our digest of the most managerially important Community developments, in this issue for the first time we introduce a set of book reviews, which are designed to tell executives why they should, or should not read one of the myriad of books now aimed at the management market. We intend to pursue a policy of increasing the information features content of the Journal as a service to readers. Next year we shall be moving to Quarterly publication.