Cloak check for the wizards of Oz

Citation

Randall, R.M. (2002), "Cloak check for the wizards of Oz", Strategy & Leadership, Vol. 30 No. 5. https://doi.org/10.1108/sl.2002.26130eaa.001

Cloak check for the wizards of Oz

Cloak check for the wizards of Oz

What do the realm of strategic management and the Wizard of Oz have in common? Both allow smoke-and-mirrors wizards that are more show than substance to go unchallenged, according to an article in this issue by a senior executive and several well-known researchers. This article will likely stimulate a little heat generation from veteran managers who enjoy venting steam about zany consultants. But we have another article that should add fuel to reader debates. Our combustion propellant is an interview with a researcher who has spent decades studying the success tactics of "great" companies. He informs us that an astute strategy is not a prerequisite to becoming a great company, and that the most successful enduring companies share a philosophy that can be expressed in a few simple maxims. It is my sincere hope that the juxtaposition of these two articles sets off a nice fireworks show.

The first article is "On misdirecting management" by Vincent Barabba, John Pourdehnad and Russell L. Ackoff. These veteran strategists warn that managers need to be more aware of the shallowness of much of the advice offered by well-known "authorities" on management. They do not just denigrate easy targets – such as the popular books purporting to offer strategy lessons from Star Trek, Lincoln, and Attila the Hun. They also caution that leading strategic sages – such as Tom Peters, Stephen Covey, Arie De Geus, and Gary Hamel – rarely provide satisfactory demonstrations that following their maxims improves performance. In fact, they cite some evidence to the contrary. They also indict these wizards of strategic Oz as purveyors of platitudes, truisms, and tautologies. Ouch!

In addition to suggesting that managers should request more proof and fewer anecdotes before accepting the wisdom of the sages, the authors propose that managers adopt a platitude defense. That is, the next time you hear a guru proclaim an insight such as, "have a bias for action", ask yourself, how could anyone argue the negative? Would anyone advise us to "have a bias for inaction"?

The second article that should ignite fireworks is an interview with Jim Collins, author of Built to Last (1994) and Good to Great (2001). Collins, a respected researcher, has legions of proselytes who admire his Zen-like maxims derived from examining what goes on at "great" companies. For example, Collins says, "First get the right people on the bus (and the wrong people off the bus) before you figure out where to drive it". Some managers find this maxim – which could be paraphrased as "First the talent, then the strategy" – to be a brilliant insight. However wise this advice may be, without a clear demonstration that it causes success, it sounds a lot like the fortune cookie philosophy lamented by Barabba et al.

But while some observers complain about the strategy wizards, others find fault with their credulous customers. While reviewing the Barabba et al. article, one of Strategy & Leadership's contributing editors wrote: "The writers are shifting too much of the blame on to gurus when much of it truly belongs to those managers who accept the gurus' advice without reservation. Much general managerial advice is derived from cases where it was exactly right for certain corporations in certain situations. Managers must sift through it and determine what fits their situation. Managers who naively repeat an unsubstantiated theory are complicit in its distribution". Ouch!

Business Week identified other causes of the blather epidemic: "It hasn't helped that in recent years the literature of management has neatly fallen into one of two trash bins: densely written, unedited abstraction or, even worse, trite and irrelevant parables created for brain-dead managers". Ouch!

The debate is fueled. Everyone has been challenged. Anybody got a match?

But do not get so carried away that you miss two sets of highly useful articles – one set on strategic conversations (by Mark McNeilly and Tony Manning) and the other set on brand portfolio strategy (one from Pierce and Moukanas and one from Petromilli, Morrison and Million).

Robert M. RandallEditor