This is the second edition of a book, which in 1993 meant to provide a “penetrating insight” into the management process. The new edition equally tries to contain the “mountains” of writings on management and stand out by adopting a different approach. This is a hard task and whichever angle and focus is pursued there will always be some gaps regarding the ways the nature of managerial work and management process are understood. For example, compare this book with a contemporary, such as that of Palmer and Hardy’s (2000) on Thinking about Management. Whilst they have embedded their review and analysis of management literature largely in a non‐traditional and partly post‐modern perspective, Hales principally embeds his analysis in a chronological account of management ideas and theories.
Managing Through Organization (MTO) attempts to fulfil three aims and thus provide: a “comparative analysis of different approaches to management and organization”; a “comprehensive review of different approaches”, and a “synthesis” of the variety of approaches. Although distinguishing these aims as such seems rather redundant, the book achieves them to a large extent in 11 chapters.
The first two chapters set the scene and also clarify the focus as to what may be seen as central to management of organization, that is, managerial power and authority and how the sources of power can be identified. Here, whilst adopting a hierarchical notion of organization, mangers are encouraged to seek co‐operation. The organizations [and managers] can thrive on collaborative advantage, which may be found in new forms of organization. Management is thus seen in an extended sense as “fusion of both ownership or business management functions and functions relating to the management of work” – an indication of how overarching the book tries to be. Yet, it admits in the closing chapters (p. 222) that “management divisions of labour represent different ways of dividing and allocating management functions … ” and depend on various dimensions including the “degree to which management functions are fragmented … ”. The question that I think needed to be asked here is the extent to which there is a need for “management” or “managers” as such. The MTO principle is meant to embrace the management divisions of labour, managerial work and management of work; a very cumbersome attempt. Equally, the analytical framework for MTO (p. 48) is to represent the definition of organization and reproduces the “classical” functions of management: planning, decision making, motivation, co‐ordination and control assembled under four headings: task, motivation, control systems and organization.
The classical management concepts, including scientific management and bureaucracy, are clearly described and their known features and weaknesses are examined (Chapters 4‐5). These are compared with alternative forms of organization. The insertion of “search for” in the titles of the chapters which follow not only highlights the complexity of the process of management and organization but also the variety of alternative forms that are offered in theory and practice. This edition has a set of case studies of some well known (also well documented ) multi‐nationals to highlight the issues discussed in most chapters.
In this revised edition, Hales has included a chapter which searches for innovation and thus the learning organization (Chapter 9). Here he writes that “in a trivial sense all organizations … learn … in that they modify their collective behaviour … ”. And “learning organizations” are those which learn in “specific, sophisticated” ways. But he ignores the point that these processes are described and interpreted post‐hoc and in a way we cannot draw a universal picture as they are firm‐specific. The chapter then considers the types of learning and characteristics of learning organizations. However, it presupposes a universal interpretation of learning, relating it at one point to the change in behaviour (p. 198) and at another point strings along (or, as it claims, synthesises) various writings on learning to support its superficial distinction between the how (the process) and what of the learning organization. The writings on organizational learning and learning organizations are nevertheless neatly enveloped here. There is also a brief reference to the works of Morgan and Zohar (pp. 199‐200) in the form of metaphors and inclusion of a non‐Newtonian view of learning. On the whole this addition is appreciated.
The fulfilment of the main aims of this book can make it a useful textbook for students. However, its claim to provide a critical evaluation of classical theories is rather exaggerated, as such critique is embedded in the writings which it attempts to synthesise. Moreover, Japanese management approaches, corporate culture, decentralisation and so on are already overworked in other text‐books. The final claim of the book, that “management divisions of labour form the bridge between forms of work organization and the nature of managerial work in different forms of organization” (p. 223), is a redundant attempt to distinguish between management, managerial work and organizing. In summary, this revised edition of MTO may have presented a synthesis of ideas but it is still unnecessarily searching for a panacea.
