Sales pitch, lyrics and some further information about our project
The purpose of the video is to show parts of the intellectual history of management in a way easy to interpret even for those not familiar with the academics of management. The lyrics focus on chosen parts of management and emphasize the message by practical examples. Of course we weren’t able to include every part of management history since it then would have ended in a whole full-length album or a complete symphony. The different perspectives chosen were those we thought best highlighting the views on how management has changed over time. As probably noticed while watching, the video includes a humoristic touch and this approach has also been incorporated when we chose which parts of management history to include. As for the visual, we have had one thought, to combine classic hip-hop video style with illustrations of the management routines described in the lyrics. This will further on contribute to this video being easier to comprehend. The classic hip-hop approach applied to 5 white guys in shiny Adidas uniforms will hopefully even further lighten up the heavy theories described in the lyrics.
It’s a commonly shared opinion among the five of us, this course verifying management as a broad concept hard to put a single definition on, and that management can be looked at through many different perspectives. But whichever perspective chosen one fact remains, it’s essential you can communicate your ideas by taking your target group’s own “language” into account, thus making the message more easy to comprehend. With this communicative perspective in focus, one of the major purposes we hope this video to fulfill is reaching another audience than just academicians. Being more precise, we want to show chosen parts and angels of management for an audience we believe less likely running in to these academic routines of management. Hoping this will encourage a discussion about different management perspectives where it might not have happened otherwise. This in mind makes it quite obvious it’s not possible doing an abstract documentary, focusing on eventual similarities between Foucault’s views on management’s episteme and Poppers methodological induction. To reach an audience less familiar with this very subject, you have to communicate in a way they understand and feel comfortable with. Here you can see strong connections to managing a company or an organization; even if you have the best strategies and the coolest management models, it’s useless if you’re not able to communicate them properly. Hence, one of the most essential aspects of management is making everyone understand where to go and which way to take. Academic routines can often seem boring for the “big mass” and we believe a humoristic approach could make the management history more interesting for our very target group. Besides the major point of the movie, i.e. communicating management theory in a new way to a new target group, it also highlights the importance of communication within the fields of management.
Hip-hop has for a long time been a tool for afro-American middle and lower class to communicate what life is all about, especially showing how the situations in some of the poorer suburbs of USA are experienced from within. We thought it a good idea taking this approach and communicating management through it, thus taking academic teaching to a completely new level; reaching people that so far have been overlooked when it comes to terms of distributing management theory.
Another reason we chose producing a hip-hop video are due to our beliefs that the management enclosing this task would be quite interesting. The management needed by us arranging and getting acceptance for the field trips to the studio and Bentleys were more demanding than we at first thought, not to mention persuading the Bentley manager to actually be a part of the video. The fact this being a zero budget production made it complicated finding a professional singer for the chorus, and even more finding a studio with someone helping us producing. There have been other suggestions of what to include in the video, which we after some time realized weren’t doable, but before accepting this we all pushed our personal connections to the limit. Another management issue we faced was to hype this project; we believed creating this hype could lead to mouth-to-mouth marketing, consequently resulting in many “hits” on Youtube. This reasoning is based on what Mr. Sköld observed in his truck-designing thesis. Sköld found out that what’s motivating truck drivers designing and “pimping” their trucks were not the actual result, but the hype of how great their next truck would be. We applied similar logic, if we get the buzz about this video going, people would build up expectations, thus urging them to see it. Hopefully, the viewers will be more satisfied after watching the video than the truck drivers were after designing the next truck.
Even before giving birth to the hip-hop idea we all agreed on doing a fun project, thus making us more committed to the task and able to produce something to be proud of. Not saying the other groups haven’t had fun, but we believe it fair to say we’re having the very most of it producing this video. Every time leaving for the studio or to shoot new scenes, the mood was at top. This might actually be the most fun we ever had at our soon to be four years at KTH. Practicing what’s been taught in theory is very valuable and it complements the teaching process satisfyingly, and if we, the students, are to be properly prepared for what’s facing us when graduated, we should definitely have more project-based learning implemented in our education.
At the beginning we had a totally different, much more academic approach. But it didn’t feel right; it became so bookish and scholastic. Then, after reflecting over the Youtube clip ‘Consulting paradise’, the hip-hop idea was born. Suddenly we were all engaged to the utmost, and the ideas were gushing. Thus confirming what’s written above, i.e. how important it is having fun, and how much better one then can make the result.
During this course we’ve been taught seeing management from several perspectives, and different models and relevant management history have been discussed during the lectures. Now the course ending, we reflect upon what we learned and how. The most learning took place during the project, managing five different minds wanting the same thing but each in their own splendid way. The models and historical perspectives are of course interesting but learning by doing is, as commonly known, the best way to learn something new.
During the project it’s been necessary for us doing further research about the different models and persons mentioned in the lyrics. Since we had to summarize and criticize them in just a few lines, understanding what they were all about was essential.
This project has indeed made the five of us, if possible, even closer. Even though the video has been ready for a while, we get together more often than before, and just ‘chilling’ which is enjoyable. It appears the kind of ‘Fun Management’ practiced by us during this project has been very successful. It is easier to work hard if you really enjoy what you are doing. Perhaps this is the title of the next Business Bestseller from KTH: ‘Fun Management – Why and how you want to do what you do’.
Considering further releases from Snowflake Productions is not unthinkable!
Sköld David, 2008, ”Behind the Green Paint: The Perverse Core of the Aesthetic Economy”, Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm
Lyrics:
Management, Here I come, You can’t hide,
Gonna find you and understand you.
Management, Here I come, You can’t hide,
Gonna define you, and start consulting.
If we look back in time, hierarchy’s the way,
Everyone that works has a boss to obey.
This will ensure total control,
But that’s not how to roll!
‘Cause when the CEO comes down to the floor,
What’s he really looking for?
Everyone hides all the stuff that looks bad,
The CEO is still glad.
Taylors rhyme, specialization’s fine,
Scientific management is worth the dime.
Robots never take a leak, they don’t even sleep,
Emotion’s overrated human sissies just weep.
But robots can’t create, fuckers work to late,
Smash them to pieces and off to China State.
People that work need different things,
Maybe fly with their own wings.
Management, Here I come, You can’t hide,
Gonna find you and understand you.
Management, Here I come, You can’t hide,
Gonna define you, and start consulting.
You know the Hawthorne studies they made?
Change motivates people – not what they’re paid,
They wanted to know which way to go.
To make workers work their best in the flow,
Such a little thing as illumination change.
made a big difference – but it ain’t so strange.
For people to feel noticed and treated right,
you might only have to lower the light.
That’s right – Remember Core Competence,
Just thinking ’bout the products is nonsense.
Look inside the company see what we do best,
That, my friend, is the most important quest.
Build your company based on this,
And no opportunity you’ll ever miss.
Prahalad, Hamel, Leonard-Barton were correct,
Upon the Core Competence we must reflect.
Management, Here I come, You can’t hide,
Gonna find you and understand you.
Management, Here I come, You can’t hide,
Gonna define you, and start consulting.
You can’t learn it all,
From the models yeah,
oh baby hey baby
Gotta combine them all oh yeah.
Boston Ma-atrix, Seven S, Outsource, Benchmarking,
Six, Sigma,
User Innovation, oh yeah.
We need to focus more on the people,
Their interaction is the company’s steeple.
Networking more important than feedback,
You should not… Yo, bring the beat back.
you should not stop worrying about sales rather,
you should start focusing on one another.
people should communicate as much they want,
and they won’t ever feel treated nonchalant.
Yo, so we talked about a thousand ways,
to look at management, and what they say.
Taylor, Mintzberg, Drucker, Hamel, Porter, Kotler, Prahalad, Dunbar,
Does anyone care who they are?
Can’t be defined, management’s too wide,
Look at those guys they already tried.
Management’s hard to put a finger on,
It’s what these guys make their money from.
Management, Here I come, You can’t hide,
Gonna find you and understand you.
Management, Here I come, You can’t hide,
Gonna define you, and start consulting.
Review of Chefs paradoxen
In the book ”Chefs Paradoxen” Thomas R. Horton describes a CEOs thoughts and work from being hired until retirement. The book is very interesting and I really encourage reading it since it present the whole picture of being a multinational CEO as well as many interesting details. After reading it I though think a more suitable title would be ‘In the mind of a big time CEO’, because that’s what the book is all about. Horton, as a resigned CEO, writes the book to the new CEO, with the idea of the book being used as a guide, making his successor successful as CEO. Horton though declares that all new CEOs, in the beginning of their career, should apply what he‘s written. Another of Horton’s purposes is to unravel the mysteries of the role as a CEO. In the book Horton also describes methods of how to avoid the most obvious problems that can strike a CEO. Horton describes the CEO from a business and humanistic perspective, as he himself has experienced and carried out the CEO-ship during a successful career. The book becomes even more interesting since it’s written in a way putting the reader as CEO during the many examples and discussions. Among other things Horton describes the CEOs decision-making, delegation, planning and the way to lead a big company, Horton also gives personal comments on how to dress and act as a CEO. Horton even goes as far as describing how to behave as a CEO when working with attractive female employees.
In an open and informal way Horton describes the leader’s passion in practicing his power but notes that leaders can be emotional as anybody else. It’s with passion and detail Horton describes the complexity of retiring from being a CEO, leaving all the power to someone else. Horton though encourages a retiring CEO to seek new inspiring jobs, maybe trying a new career such as dean at a college or parliamentary undersecretary or equal. I believe Horton in an admirable way describes the life of a CEO. He describes the CEO from a causality perspective with good pedagogic, clearly stating how to become a leader of world class. When unravelling the mysteries of the CEO, Horton gives examples he himself has experienced, as well as his friends in similar positions. Some of the examples are “spiced up” a bit I can imagine, thus making the book more interesting. So with this in mind one can say that Horton succeeds achieving one of his purposes with the book; to unravel the role of a CEO. he still describes the CEO as a person with extra ordinary abilities though, a person to look up to. This is, according to Horton, based on the CEOs unique talents running a multinational company.
Consequently I believe it fair to say Horton succeeding unravelling the mysteries of a CEO, but in the same time creating a halo surrounding it, i.e. the role of a CEO demands abilities beyond the ordinary. One of Horton’s other purposes, suggesting different methods making the CEOs day to day job easier, is limited to giving advice such as learn to listen, learn to delegate and being rational, which I hardly consider methods, rather just friendly advice. In this purpose I consider Horton’s attempts trying making science of his own advice, not achievable since I believe his ideas too subjective and not possessing the appropriate substance. This glorified depiction of the CEO, from Horton’s helicopter point of view, is about CEO at big American companies, hence the many examples from Horton’s friends with just such roles, e.g. General Motors and Coca-Cola etc. Very well educated people with extremely high performance potential, but limited when seeing the world from e.g. Joe the Plummer’s perspective (John McCain’s election campaign 2008). Joe the Plummer and many many others, that are CEOs of their own companies or at small or medium sized companies have completely different working situations than the one Horton describes. In this aspect I believe Horton misses his purpose unravelling the mysteries of a CEO since him just focusing on companies of enormous size, and those big hotshot CEOs hardly stand like Joe the Plummer with dirt under the nails among their employees on the “working floor”.
In the world of business in a Horton perspective, there only exists men, and Horton thinks and writes as the man he is, female CEOs are hardly mentioned in the book. This can be seen as an example on the male domination amongst CEOs when the book was written in 1994, and still is, but hopefully in much lesser extent. One of the things I have reflected mostly upon is Horton not, with a single word, mentioning the union and how it by defending its interest, and through actions can limit the freedom of a CEO. Even the board of directors or owners are hardly mentioned, thus not at all described how they can control or influence a CEO. Another thing I consider strange, is Horton not seeing the unions and owners as resources to establish consensus when solving different kinds of company related problems. Almost as strange is Horton not writing anything substantial about the collaboration and relation between a CEO and the public opinion, the media and the political parties in a prevailing society. Having the purpose Horton has, it’s astonishing he’s not mentioning anything about these important “pressure” groups almost every CEO, at small or big companies, are related to whether they like it or not. Horton’s forgotten chapter should be named ‘The CEOs acting in a social context.
Horton represents a humanistic and management based view of the economical systems CEOs are part of, but Horton’s depiction of the reality is of course the one from a big time CEOs perspective. What Horton forgets to mention, or isn’t aware of is the labour force also being individuals needing acceptance and encouragement. They are by Horton just given production-factors in a profitable environment. In the market capitalistic world of Horton it seems to be no room for philosophical, humanistic or profitable aspects concerning the well being of individuals – and thereby the possibility of more devoted individuals producing more and better. This is according to my opinion also considered a forgotten chapter that probably would contribute with interesting aspects for a person soon to become CEO.
Horton has written a book full of advice CEOs at big, multinational companies should take in to account. But it’s clear that the advices are for those really big company CEOs, not the average or small time CEOs. For those soon to be big time CEOs, fitting the target group of the book, Horton appears as a strong sender of norms and values for expected behaviours and mindsets of attitudes. Horton goes so much in to details that he gives recommendations on what’s proper to wear as CEO, and how to create your own leader characteristics. At the same time as recommending different leadership styles, Horton malign other big CEO’s due to them strutting around in the limelight, or as the Lee Iacocca and Donald Trump, being publicity hunters and writing books just for bragging! Horton though writes, which I believe evident, CEOs can be all kinds of types, from chatterboxes to reflecting thinkers, to despots or collaborators. Horton’s tip is though to be yourself as much as possible, commenting that you sometimes have to mount a role making some for you, less natural decisions more easy.
As a summary I want to make some last statements. Horton writes open-heartedly, humoristic and in an easy way, sharing the norms he has lived according to and acted on; values he think other CEOs should consider. When looked upon the book from a big multinational company perspective, I believe Horton to be successful achieving his purposes, apart from some mistakes or forgotten chapters. When seen from small or medium companies standpoint, or the public’s point of view, the book still has a lot to accomplish. After reading the book and reflecting upon it I believe Horton had a third, secret purpose, namely to mock other CEOs he believe to be chatterboxes, writing their own books just for bragging.
Analysis of “all the wrong moves”
The article “All the wrong moves” is the subject of my following discussion. The article and heading indicates possible mismanagement and wrong decision-making if judged by the prevailing company culture in U.S.A. According to me, all decisions concerning mismanagement in the article wouldn’t be considered mismanagement in Sweden, this statement is according to my beliefs that managers in Sweden more often tries to achieve consensus than in they do in the U.S.A., but I admit that it’s a question of one’s opinion about mismanagement and nonetheless, how one experience the different company cultures.
In this paper I’m going to discuss the managerial problems in the article without going into the details concerning the problems themselves. The contents of the article and the possibility of mismanagement, can according to me, be categorized and analyzed in different periods of time. I believe everything in the company happened according to a timetable, and if using a metaphor, an ice-hockey game, determined by external variables; and the decision-making in the company as pre-actions of those variables. The company faces three problematic periods and each period depends on the previous one but is played during different circumstances in different ways. For the company this means a new set of decision-making in each period, of which they have no idea.
Note: the company seems to have a history without serious managerial problems, but all of a sudden a huge one occurs.
The first period is when the CEO assembles all his managers to discuss the new problem. The managers take part in suggesting how the problem should be addressed, but the CEO doesn’t take any decisions except the one establishing a subcommittee with the mission to find a solution to the problem. None of the managers seem happy with this decision and different groups arise, partly based on ideas how to solve the problem and partly based on individuals not accepting each other. The following day, all managers agree to the subcommittee solution, and seem happy about it, which is more than strange.
I think the CEO acts according to the schoolbook of problem solving. All the managers seemed to be frustrated at the first meeting but in just 24 hours he made them all agree and brought them to joint action. Consequently the CEO made everyone aware of the problem, and by the subcommittee he united them in action. As said above, I think this method, building on consensus, is more common in Sweden than in U.S.A. This first period should be to the CEOs advantage.
When it in the second period occurs their company didn’t cause the problem, it’s obvious the CEO acted to fast in the first period, neglecting (direct or indirect) to find out whether the problem really was their fault or not. One should though note that it isn’t easy to make the right decisions in time of crisis, but this is what a CEO is supposed to do and is paid for.
I think the CEO should have given the subcommittee more time to explore the width of the problem, he should also have requested, in detail, what the source of the problem was.
I believe there should be more time and effort spent on investigations before withdrawing a costly product to this extent. The second period is therefore a loss for the CEO. One might though also reflect over why the board isn’t mentioned in the article, have the CEO even informed them about the problem, or consulted them before withdrawing the product?
During the time facing the third period, the CEO has engaged a consultant, examining the decision-making process in the company. The consultant’s conclusion is the whole decision-making process within the company being inefficient, and that conflicts often are ignored or mistreated. At this time the CEO, being aware of what the problems within the company really are, has the opportunity to take command and act with power, and guide his managers with clear goals and objects, but he doesn’t. Instead he asks for volunteer members to create a new subcommittee, lining out a decision-making process within the company.
The third period is when the CEO truly shows his lack of leadership abilities, hence demonstrating that he indeed isn’t a suitable leader. I therefore believe him being the looser in this period, and maybe even in the whole game.
I don’t think the CEO made all the wrong moves, but the most important ones he did.
The article points out the necessity of companies having a strong and well-organized management with competent leaders to rely on.
The rap is mixed and completed!
The final song is ready and you should all have it by now. What do you guys think, comments?
Awesome
Great studio work everybody, I’m sending the track on lector, happy listening!
Studio time tomorrow
The studio time tomorrow is 3pm at Sibyllegatan 50A. Don’t forget to bring the clothes and the attitude!
Some thoughts of “The Nice Guy”
In the beginning I asked myself if Paul indeed, with his quiet timid way, was CEO material. Irrespective to this, Paul has, to become CEO, undergo some major personality changes. What I keep asking myself is, if a person like Paul can undergo such big changes to his personality and still feel good about. What I’m trying to say is that Paul really should feel that the new Paul is “the real Paul”, otherwise, if he feels it’s just a façade, and that he’s not behind the decisions he’s taking completely, it will cause a great deal of problems, both for Paul, the company, the employees and maybe even to Paul’s family.
I also wonder if it’s even plausible for a person to change personality this much? And if so, how is this to be done? Can Paul do this by himself or does he need the help of other people, and or some kind of course or education?
Another aspect I think might be good to consider is how the social environment would develop if Paul becomes CEO. Since Paul has been with the company as long as he has, all personnel know him and his personality/behavior. If he makes the changes needed to become CEO, I don’t think the employees would look at him the same way. How could one, e.g. as an external consultant, make this transition as smooth as possible, both for Paul and the employees?
Here is an illustration of how I imagine Paul’s office
