"Peters is ... the father of the post-modern corporation."
Why do people follow Gurus?One explanation can be the search for meaning in life. They offer fulfilment and promise a peaceful and happy life .
Herein the emphasis lies on management Gurus. Can we transfer the above to a management context? In management we follow rules, rituals and symbols. Every morning we are called to the holy mass, worshipping the corporate identity manual and confessing our companies inability to
keep the promise of short delivery times to our customer . Our consultant will teach us by showing us how we can improve quality, reduce wastage and improve happiness in our jobs.
Tom Peters with his work on "excellent companies" lay the foundation of the work presented. Utilizing postmodernist techniques, the author challenges the teachings of the so called management gurus.
Decentering, deconstructing and reflecting back on itself the author critically re-evaluates his personal guru. As a result a new perception of the circle commonly known as management gurus materializes and the insights gained are to be used as a tool in modern management.
Are modern managers mislead in their thinking by following the wrong ideas?
1) How do we recognise a Guru if we see one?
a) The term guru derives from the Sanskrit and stands for a religious teacher. People not only hold the person, the physical appearance of the guru, as being sacred, but also the knowledge and the conduit of self-realisation. When broken apart the word guru becomes:
'gu' which represents darkness and
‘ru’ meaning remover.
To make sense of the above one has to understand that the term “darkness” represents lack of knowledge, avidya.
In seeking moksha, the liberation from the cycle of death and rebirth believers can seek a relationship to a living guru, since gurus are the embodiment of god. In modern use of language and writing a guru, especially in the west, has extended its metaphorical meaning to “expert”.
The question that arises is “Why do we follow Gurus?”.
One explanation can be the search for meaning in life. They offer fulfilment and promise a peaceful and happy life[1].
Herein the emphasis lies on management Gurus. How can we transfer the above to a Management context? If we accept religion as a framework of rituals and symbols we can apply the idea of religion to Management. In Management we follow rules, rituals and symbols. Every morning we are called to the holy mass, worshipping the
corporate identity manual and confessing our companies inability to
keep the promise of short delivery times to our customer[2]. Our Consultant will teach us by showing us how we can improve quality, reduce wastage and improve happiness in our jobs.
2) The chosen One - Tomas Peters, the preacher of a new religion
In order to answer the questions of the given task it was necessary to chose one particular Guru. Because of the methodology used[3] the choice was to focus on Thomas (Tom) Peters, co-author of In Search of Excellence and many other books. His book In Search of Excellence is another source of inspiration for the findings presented herein. To understand the rational behind the choice it is important to explore the reason as to why Tomas Peters can be seen as a Guru. It is worthwhile mentioning that Guru Ranking exist and are male dominated. In Accenture’s Guru Ranking Peters came in second only outstripped by Porter[4].
a) What makes this person a Guru?
i) Given we accept the application of the religious term of Guru to the modern world of corporate culture a Management Guru can be seen as a teacher with expert knowledge. By demonstrating his superior knowledge he will guide the way into wisdom. His book was revolutionary because it identified the key concepts of success of what he called “excellent companies”. If we the believers would now follow these concepts everyone should have an understanding of what it takes to transfer a company from mediocrity to excellence. In this particular case the world of corporate business
was awaiting the advent of a new bible[5]. Peters was able to deliver because he identified what needed to be written. In his own way he gave his idea meaning by writing In Search of Excellence[6]. Peters became a Guru because he had the gift to present his work in a time where Managers strived for solutions. It was the right thing to do since there was a demand for his expert knowledge[7]. In a later part there will be a discussion about the importance of the timing to enforce this statement.
ii) Being a teacher is not good enough to make someone a Guru. Where is the Management Gurus Nirvana? What is the ultimate stage of completion and wholeness? For us to judge over a Guru it is unavoidable to create new and obvious criteria which in return are subjective. The following samples are used to assess why Peters is presented as being a Guru:
(1) Sales figures can be used as an indication of the wisdom of the Guru. If the knowledge is able to dispel the darkness from our minds it is surly an indication of his wisdom. His book, being reprinted a number of times, is one of the bestselling books in the field of management world-wide[8].
(2) In a recent survey[9] the status of the 50 most popular Gurus was assessed using the number of hits for Gurus names on the internet. In addition an extensive search was conducted on how many citations and references where made to each individual Guru and their work. Again, a huge amount of citations and references would hint at the wisdom of the Guru.
(3) Another criterion that can be used is the influence the Guru is exerting. Are there significant changes following the knowledge dissemination of the Guru? In the case of Peters we can surly answer this question with “Yes”. Not only had his book a high influence on the world of business, but it also inspired other authors to follow his concept[10]. Not only is he said to be the initiator of the Guru-Gaze[11], but he is the Ur-Guru[12] !
3) Me without you
Clearly Peters has used writing as an extension of the spoken word in order to reach more followers for his message[13]. He himself is a de-constructor. In his work he analyses the factors that make companies successful by looking at the components they are built from. But can Peters exist as a Guru by himself? In my understanding the Guru exists in a vivid environment. The self is more than just the Guru, but includes his environment too. De-centring the self therefore means to extend this method to the environment too. Following I will do so by finding a number of traces that unearth the non-visible elements that unify the Guru with his environment[14].
a) As we hold the books that Peters has written in our hands we see him as the author. However, an author can not exist without its audience. Peters is described as a Guru, a teacher. Like any other teacher his lessons would be senseless if there wasn’t any audience. The audience needs to be specific, not just any audience. The Guru requires the audience to be thirsty for his wisdom. There needs be appreciation of this new religion taught by this preacher of management practices. Here, one Author is having a massive number of worshippers. In Search of Excellence has sold more than three million copies. It is us, the audience that is in the centre of attention of the author, not vice versa. However, it is the author that is perceived as a Guru; so clearly, audience is more important than he himself and he has written his books for us, those who want to learn. We are his centre of attention. Our absenteeism is a clear statement of our presence.
[...]
[1] See wordiq.com (2004)
[2] See Thomas (1993), page 63-69
[3] See Appendix A
[4] See Accenture.com (2004) and see Appendix B and C
6 See Peters et al. (1982), page 19-26
[6] See Derrida (1978), page 11
[7] See Kennedy (2004) and see Whitford (2004)
[8] See Kennedy (2004)
[9] See Accenture.com (2004)
[10] See Collins (1992), page1-16
[11] See Kennedy (2004)
[12] See Whitford (2004)
[13] Basis for section 3 is all reading mentioned under „References“.
[14] Note by the author: Due to space limitation focus on five “Splinters”, whereas more exist.
- Citation du texte
- BA (Hons) International Management Stefan Pertz (Auteur), 2005, The guru in me - Critical perspectives on management, Munich, GRIN Verlag, https://www.grin.com/document/34976
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