Tuesday, January 04, 2005
Why not learn from modern management theory?
The efforts of the international community when it comes to development are respectable but not impressive. However, the results are largely disappointing. William Easterly, for example, documents this failure in his book "The Elusive Quest for Growth".
I believe this non-performance of development work is mainly due to the focus of development institutions on macro-economics and a bird's eye view of policy making in general. With no means I want to state that these are not of importance, yet I think they are only part of the story. Focusing on this macro-view is as if we would believe that an economy with a sound policy framework wouldn't need any companies and knowledgeable managers and entrepreneurs to function.
So I think the development community should complement their macro-view with a micro-view. For example why not learn from modern management theory? A concept that is currently en vogue is the empowerment of employees to foster innovation and rapid response to market changes. It's all about respecting an employee's knowledge and competencies and giving him the space to own a part of a company's performance by giving him the power to act. One hugely successful "development initiative" that has built on ownership is the Grameen Village Phone project.
Another concept from management theory is knowledge management. The World Bank is currently trying to apply this concept by repositioning itself as a knowledge bank. Another place where knowledge management has had an impressive, yet small, impact was at UNAIDS. Through a partnership with BP they introduced modern management tools to empower knowledge exchange between communities in order to reply to AIDS.
The application of modern management theory and tools in International Organizations and NGOs is still rare but in my opinion essential if we want to achieve results in development.
I believe this non-performance of development work is mainly due to the focus of development institutions on macro-economics and a bird's eye view of policy making in general. With no means I want to state that these are not of importance, yet I think they are only part of the story. Focusing on this macro-view is as if we would believe that an economy with a sound policy framework wouldn't need any companies and knowledgeable managers and entrepreneurs to function.
So I think the development community should complement their macro-view with a micro-view. For example why not learn from modern management theory? A concept that is currently en vogue is the empowerment of employees to foster innovation and rapid response to market changes. It's all about respecting an employee's knowledge and competencies and giving him the space to own a part of a company's performance by giving him the power to act. One hugely successful "development initiative" that has built on ownership is the Grameen Village Phone project.
Another concept from management theory is knowledge management. The World Bank is currently trying to apply this concept by repositioning itself as a knowledge bank. Another place where knowledge management has had an impressive, yet small, impact was at UNAIDS. Through a partnership with BP they introduced modern management tools to empower knowledge exchange between communities in order to reply to AIDS.
The application of modern management theory and tools in International Organizations and NGOs is still rare but in my opinion essential if we want to achieve results in development.
