The Making of Modern Management : British Management in Historical Perspective [ electronic resource ] /
by John F. Wilson and Andrew Thomson.
- Oxford Scholarship Online, 2007
There is a dearth of literature on management history as a key factor in modern economic society. This book aims to rectify that. It covers the period since the Second Industrial Revolution that started around 1870, when new organizational structures and managerial systems and skills became necessary. It focuses on manufacturing and larger-scale business, since these are the areas which have caused the greatest controversy about the weaknesses displayed by British industry in comparison to other countries such as the USA, Germany, and later Japan in the move to managerial capitalism. The book uses two main sets of explanatory factors. First, it uses a wide range of twenty-six ‘drivers’ or influences on the development of management, which are brought together in three categories (technological-cum-market; institutional/cultural; and business policy and practice). Second, it takes up four main themes that explain why Britain may have fallen behind: the persistence of personal and proprietorial capitalism; organizational structure and transaction costs; social attitudes towards industry; and the slow transition towards professionalism. The twelve chapters in the book are divided into five sections in which management is analysed according to different perspectives: a scene-setting and theoretical introduction; a focus on organizational development; a contextual focus concentrating on managers as a group; a focus on key managerial functions; and a concluding chapter which reflects on the recent changes in the themes.