Book Review: Reinventing Management

I approached Reinventing Management: Smarter Choices for Getting Work Done by Julian Birkinshaw with enthusiasm.

Management gets such a bad press and it certainly does need to be ‘reinvented’. The author is right to argue “Management as we know it today is struggling to do the job it intended to do?” Too often there is a massive gap between what management does and what it ought to be doing. He discusses important issues and provides invaluable insights and suggestions that can help to develop a distinctive management model as a basis for providing a valuable competitive advantage.

But, ultimately I found the book disappointing and a missed opportunity. In essence, I believe at the core of this ‘reinvention’ is the need for management to revisit the two inter-related concepts of values and leadership. Management (& leadership which, in my view, is a critical part of good management) shouldn’t be just about how to implement more sophisticated tools and techniques; it needs to be driven by a genuine concern for and commitment to the mission of the organisation and the long-term interests of all the stakeholders: In other words by values. Without this under-pinning focus we are really only talking about ‘repackaging’ rather than ‘reinvention’.

Reviewed by Professor Bruce Lloyd FCMI, London South Bank University

Jossey-Bass
£18.99
ISBN 978-0-470-75011-7