"Even more important than any particular discipline is the discipline of good thinking, and that can come from a serious grounding in any serious field of inquiry..."(p.385, 2004)
Mintzberg writes persuasively that MBA programs become self perpetuating programs that often select cognitively gifted but emotionally blind, self-centred individualists and then train them not to act but to control the actions of others. MBA encourages abstraction and detachment; it favors the hard and the analytical, and develops the problems of Heroic Leader – look out not in; dramatic; focus on present.
But management practice itself is soft and social.
Mintzberg’s framework to produce ‘engaged’ managers who have a ‘will to manage’ rather than just an interest in business. International Program in Practicing Management (IMPM). Right people (practicing managers) at the right time (mid-career) with the right outcome (engagement). Management and Leadership are interchangeable, and is something to be fostered and evolved rather than injected.
There is evidence that arts and science students progress quicker than business. I would agree that the more abstract a field the more it develops pure reasoning skills. Technical skills are most important is low level managerial jobs, but less so at middle and top where the key traits include communications skills, the ability to formulate problems and reasoning. Arts more characterized by formal thought, structural relationships, abstract models, symbolic languages and deductive reasoning.
I like Mintzberg for his consistent message about getting away from the hype about technique and heroic leaders. More thoughtfulness is called for.
Mintzberg writes persuasively that MBA programs become self perpetuating programs that often select cognitively gifted but emotionally blind, self-centred individualists and then train them not to act but to control the actions of others. MBA encourages abstraction and detachment; it favors the hard and the analytical, and develops the problems of Heroic Leader – look out not in; dramatic; focus on present.
But management practice itself is soft and social.
Mintzberg’s framework to produce ‘engaged’ managers who have a ‘will to manage’ rather than just an interest in business. International Program in Practicing Management (IMPM). Right people (practicing managers) at the right time (mid-career) with the right outcome (engagement). Management and Leadership are interchangeable, and is something to be fostered and evolved rather than injected.
There is evidence that arts and science students progress quicker than business. I would agree that the more abstract a field the more it develops pure reasoning skills. Technical skills are most important is low level managerial jobs, but less so at middle and top where the key traits include communications skills, the ability to formulate problems and reasoning. Arts more characterized by formal thought, structural relationships, abstract models, symbolic languages and deductive reasoning.
I like Mintzberg for his consistent message about getting away from the hype about technique and heroic leaders. More thoughtfulness is called for.
Comments