The Encyclopedia of Management, in its sixth edition, is a substantive one volume title of over a thousand pages of content. There are just over 350 entries on a diverse range of topics with unsurprising entries such as Knowledge Management or Delegation, but also some more unusual topics like Artificial Intelligence or Spirituality in Leadership (which by the way is defined as “developing employees as whole people”).
This has the smell of a textbook but I must admit I did enjoy dipping into some of the entries. When coming to review this title, I think having no previous management training was also an advantage. I found each entry simply written boiling down each concept to its essentials. Management theory is laden with jargon but on the whole I feel this encyclopedia has mostly avoided that. Where there are cliché topics such as Best Practice (defined as the most efficient way of doing something – no surprises there) some critique of the concept is included.
Looking at a typical entry like Business Plan one will find an opening paragraph providing a basic definition. An entry will quote from different sources, either commentary, journals or textbooks. There will be subheadings which, in this example, go into more detail such as Elements of a Business Plan, Recent Trends and Living Documents. There is also cross‐referencing to related headings, being here Entrepreneurship and Venture Capital. At the end of each entry there is also a bibliography including journal articles, books and web sites.
There are a couple of issues I have with this encyclopedia. One is that it has a strong US slant. There are a minority of entries that are of concern only to US corporate law, but all bibliographic references seem to be from US web sites or published books. Does management not exist outside of the USA? Are there no new ideas coming from Europe or Asia worth mentioning? My other concern is that the writers of the articles are not mentioned, only the “project editors”, of which there are four. That is not to critique the quality of the content, which as far as I can tell is sound. For me it would just be preferable to know who had written what entry.
One feature I found very helpful was one of the beginning sections called Guide to Functional‐Area Readings. In plain English that means subject headings. If a reader is interested in Human Resources Management or Emerging Topics in Management a full list of relevant entries to read are listed. By following those entries a reader could get a pretty good grasp of areas within that field. The index section, as expected, is comprehensive.
This is therefore a great title for those who want to dip in and out of the subject or get the basics of a topic quickly in concise language; indeed, it would be a handy reference tool for the beginning student. However, one point about the very “immature” nature of management studies (as quoted in an entry) is the nature of management itself. Is it an art or a science? Can managing ever be learnt from a textbook? Does the language of management become self referential, a laudable attempt to make some sense of irrational humans in self interested organizations? This is a philosophical question that has no answer (this title's entry on the Art and Science of Management seems to draw this conclusion). There is no answer in this book or anywhere else, but one certainty is that management will always be with us, as I'm sure will more revised editions of books on it.
