TABLE OF CONTENTS You can't "manage" people. But you can bribe them.
David Aycock, former CEO, Nucor Steel
( New York Times, January 14, 1992)
The need for management is widely assumed to be self-evident. However, management, as a function performed by people specifically employed and trained for the role, is relatively recent in historical terms. In warfare, for instance, the role of staff officer (in effect a military manager) only came into being with Napoleon [1].
A bird's eye view of a human activity system, in Figure 14.1, shows an organization of complementary subsystems with no evident management, at least in the sense of no management organization and nobody "in charge;" the overall system works provided everyone knows what he is doing and is motivated to do it. Does such an organization exist? Could such an organization exist?
Psychologists observe a major difference between the sexes when people come together in some undertaking. Among males, there will be a period during which there is more interest in establishing dominance and pecking order than in work. Among female-only groups, initial behavior can be quite different, with no one eager to take charge, and everyone keen to establish relationships. Often female-only groups work successfully together with one or more acting as a coordinator, but with no one in charge.
There may be a difference in outcome between...
