Management Fads: Buyer Beware
“Whatever you are, be a good one.” — Abraham Lincoln
One of the fascinating phenomenon of human beings is our lemming-like tendency to follow fads. From goldfish-swallowing to pet rocks, Hula Hoops and yo-yos to chain letters, America has been a seedbed for all kinds of crazes.
What’s interesting is that when these kids grow up they often continue to do what they’ve always done: follow fads. This is especially weird when it’s a business leader purportedly “leading” while imposing the latest management fad on their organization, a fad that they themselves are following.
Total Quality Management (TQM), Six Sigma, Management By Objectives (MBO), Japanese management, Management by Walking Around, 360-Degree Feedback are just a few of the management ideas that have become sacred in some circles over the course of my lifetime. What they are very good at is producing motivational buzzwords and slogans (like “Continuous Improvement”) which sound good on the surface, but do you walk the talk?
Fads, like fashions, come and go. What’s interesting is when two conflicting management styles contradict each other. I remember a marketing director who had received contradictory memos from the president on the same day. The morning memo came from the Empowerment School of Management in which the workers who are down below on the chart…
