ABSTRACT
Since the early 1980s there has been a growing interest in management knowledge in the western world. This has taken many forms. Special sections on management are published in newspapers, and American business magazines like the Harvard Business Review, Fortune and Business Week are disseminated worldwide. Moreover, a number of local business journals appear in many countries. These magazines cover the fads and the popular practically oriented development in the broad field of managerial knowledge. Another feature is an increasing number of seminars and short courses on management-related issues which are arranged inside companies and offered on the market. These are of various kinds, some being connected to business schools and universities and organised as management development programmes mainly based on academic research; others are more spectacular, where for example clergymen and actors have been engaged to give lectures. Programmes are also devised, based on psychology and oriental mysticism, to help people become familiar with their ‘inner energy’ and build up their self-confidence. Furthermore, the market for various kinds of management consultancy has grown, where the supply varies from offering adventurous tours for top management to conducting sophisticated clinical analyses of organisations’ problems followed by suggestions, advice and support on how to cure them. Concerning the latter kind of consultancy, a preeminent feature during the 1980s was the increasing worldwide activities pursued by, in particular, American-based consulting firms like Arthur Andersen & Co., the Boston Consulting Group, and McKinsey & Co. These endeavours have continued and escalated in the 1990s.
