Bringing the art of management to book Available to Purchase

Management writing has probably suffered more than any other part of literature from information pollution. The proliferation of reading that is available to most managers has had the interesting consequence, as I found when I asked ten colleagues at random, of putting books and to a lesser extent journals and magazines in the category of pictures on the wall. They are nice to be seen, rarely read, and occupy vacant space. They impress. The owner has a budget for books. That they become outdated and that many of them were not worth writing — or worth buying — in the first place is barely relevant. They establish status. They say something perhaps to others — he is the sort of person who tries to keep up to date (sic!). On a recent office bookshelf a Survey of Modern Knowledge dated 1921 had a prominent place. They also provide another bit of furniture in the spartan veneer of plasticated ferroconcrete and glass that make up modern offices.