I
have two degrees in management. The field attracted me because of
its wide-ranging constellation of concepts with positive
connotations. Management involves strategic and tactical planning;
discipline; a shared focus on the past, present, and future; striving
for efficiency and effectiveness; statistical analysis; cultivating
accountability and responsibility; a blending of pragmatism and
idealism; interest in, study of, and allocation of human resources;
organizational and institutional structure, industrial engineering,
networking and colleague development; socialization; competence;
providing for motivation and related incentives; marketing; macro and
micro economics; accounting principles; conceptualization and
control; dynamic entrepreneurial creativity; initiative; status as
reflected in organizational position held and the accoutrements of
power; the ability and means to excel; the mission to face reality
and make it productive; the systematic conceptual delineation of
management as a field of knowledge and thoughtful study. All these
facets of management have a profound attraction of me and I view them
as strongly positive.
This
afternoon I watched several episodes of Auschwitz: Inside the
Nazi State. The documentary showed how all the tools of
management (except ethics) were astonishingly exercised in the
service of evil. With my deep-seated predilections in favor of
management and its array of positive connotations, if I had been an
average bystander within the Nazi state would I have admired the
Nazis whose highly credentialed officers were, after all, good (even excellent) dressers, and who resided far above reproach by a humble citizen like
me.
Print Page
