The Future of Management

Abstract

This article attempts to foresee the role of managers in the 1980s. The future challenge for business and other leaders is in fitting the corporate problem perspective into a society which will no longer draw sharp borderlines between private and public enterprises. Managers will have to set an atmosphere where collective objectives allow for a symbiotic relationship between the private and public sectors; for manager and employees will be tacitly assuming that leadership reaches beyond the corporation. Neither the competitive nature of the marketplace nor the proprietory character of research and development will hinder this co-operation.

The paper predicts that such an interdependency between the two sectors will involve a diffusion of power and reversal of the classical shape of management hierarchy. This reversal, however, will not imply any loss of agility or flexibility. If sound business decisions are to add up to purposeful social decisions, the corporate purpose must be perceived by the public as being as much in their interest as in the private interest.

Four fields of endeavour, where management can most readily demonstrate its genuine concern for a rewarding societal role and where a symbiotic relationships with the public sector can flourish, have been selected for detailed discussion¹ employment, technology, advertising, and profits.