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Paper within Counselling and Business Development
Author: Anda Cedere
Annie
Dao
Peggy
Rapko
Irma Yxhage
Tutor: Anders Johansson
Sven-Erik
Johansson
Jönköping November 1999
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1 Introduction
In this report we are going to answer the
question whether management consultants are magicians. We will primarily refer
to the article by Clark and Salaman (1996) “The Management Guru as
Organisational Witchdoctor”. Prior to discussion some terms will be defined,
especially pointing out the different focus of the article and hence its
relevance to our topic. Then the article will be briefly summarised and
discussed. Afterwards we will seek to extend the discussion to cover the topic
of management consultants.
1.1 Definitions
Our focus of this paper is management
consultants, while Clark and Salaman (1996) essentially focus on management
gurus as consultants. They intentionally draw a strict line between them and
other management consultants with the purpose to present their point clearly
and evidently. We however face a more complex task in having to comment on all
management consultants. In order to do that we will occasionally refer to
various types of consultants, but inevitably much of the discussion will turn
about management gurus as the metaphor most clearly applies to them.
Magician, according to WWWebster dictionary
(see Appendix 1), is someone skilled in magic or producing tricks and
illusions. Looking up the word appearing in explanations we found the following
recurring motives ascribed to magicians: (1) having extraordinary powers,
influence, attraction, charm, (2) producing of illusions, tricks, (3) seeming
to have access to or use supernatural forces, (4) wisdom, knowledge, skills.
All these descriptions do not form a solid picture of a magician, rather, it
gives four distinct (not necessarily compatible) characteristics. In our
analysis, we will therefore approach these characteristics separately rather
than trying to judge whether management consultants (by profession) are or are
not magicians.
Witchdoctor (resp., witch doctor), on the
other hand, had only one entry in this dictionary (see Appendix 1). It is a
narrow term describing “a professional worker of magic usually in a primitive
society who often works to cure sickness”(WWWebster Dictionary). As to other
metaphors mentioned in the text by Clark and Salaman (1996), they mostly refer
to religious leaders (often simultaneously “doctors” in primitive societies.
Their concept fits within the characteristics of magicians, yet it is more specific,
narrow.
In order to find out the real effect of
management consultants and draw parallels, it is necessary to look at their
activities, relationships and interaction with their clients, and their mutual
attitudes, expectations and beliefs.
2 Gurus as Witchdoctors of Modern Age
In their article, Clark and Salaman find
striking similarities between the way management gurus and witchdoctors
operate. They have found that spectacular performance aimed at the consciousness
of audience (while keeping certain secrets and mystique) is a central feature
of the activities of both. They basically argue that management gurus are the
witchdoctors of the modern world through similarities in their role, focus,
technique, even nature of knowledge, background and effect of their work.
According to Clark and Salaman (1996), focus of their activities is the
audience (managers) and their cognition, not the subject matter itself
(organisations, their structures and processes). They do not aim that much to
change activities and structures as their hearts and feelings (Huczynsky 1993,
cited in Clark and Salaman 1996), with the claim to improve organisational
skills and processes. Common characteristics of their performances are surprise, emotion, tension, high energy levels,
audience involvement and mutual risk, mysteriousness (riddles and paradoxes),
and non-rationality of the conveyed messages. Content of their work is to achieve transformations in
consciousness and impress (thus building own social power that rests in
reputation), and the method of their
work is short, face-to-face, verbal one-way communication, events that are
characterised by emotion, mystery, paradox, tension and risk.
2.1 Discussion
While generally the article was very
persuasive, interesting and appealing, there are some aspects upon which we
would like to comment. We believe that sometimes, in order to present their
point with conviction, the authors (much like the witch-hunters of medieval
ages) have overemphasised some characteristics of management gurus – so
presenting them more similar to witchdoctors.
First of all, the article overly focuses on
performance as the key explanation to guru success, but we want to argue that
the method of guru work is not just
surprising and impressing by a brilliant performances, since modern educated
management audience expect more than just a form. They expect and demand
content – innovative ideas, which are relevant for solving their problems. The
very existence of gurudom does not explain why there are so many “believers”
who recognise gurus, their ideas and work, among those who have never seen
(been part of and been affected by) their performance. They are instead
astonished by their ideas and knowledge.
Similarly, while emphasising the irrational aspects of the performances,
the authors fail to acknowledge the rational content in their rhetoric. At the
very least, some of their arguments and ideas appeal to rationality (seem
rational), quite contrary to witchdoctors of primitive societies.
Their rhetoric
(or performance) is still highly persuasive, but it of course differs from that
of witchdoctors, as they live and operate in other circumstances. The media
used by gurus are both personal presentation (performance) and writing. Books
produced by management gurus probably form very major part of their popularity
and influence. It is also a kind of performance, using specific rhetoric of
persuasion and creating own “magical” image.
Also the focus
of guru’s work is not purely the
audience (managers). It could be in the front- stage of their performance, but
not in the back-stage preparation process, in development and eventually in the
content of their ideas they do focus on the object – management problems. They
surely address management as the audience of their work, but the object of the
conveyed messages is organisations, systems, market, environment, etc. So we
can conclude that in fact they focus both on the audience and the subject
matter.
The authors also have claimed that the content of guru work resembles that of
witchdoctors in that they claim to achieve transformations in consciousness,
and pass on the skills of decision making, diagnosis, etc. Yes, these are
characteristics of process consultants’ job, but witchdoctors would never do
that. Their skills are secret and the only thing passed to the audience is the
emotional and cultural effect. Their work is even less tangible than that of
management consultants, let alone management gurus.
We believe that while emphasising the
performance and enchanting aspects of management guru performances, the authors
have overlooked the deep general knowledge
of gurus. They argue that the knowledge they possess “lacks the status and
authority of other professional knowledge” and that “rigorous and long training
[...] is irrelevant”, because their success “lies more in the management of the
guru-client relationship as an event”. Without questioning the emphasis of the
article, we would rather suggest that the training and expertise is relevant
and necessary for arriving at the ideas, for building the relationship, the
image and reputation in the first place. Management gurus must be more than
merely brilliant actors (performers) – not every witchdoctor can easily be a
guru. There is undoubtedly also a content (not just process) in their
performance, developed on the basis of some good knowledge of the field, own
experience and creativity.
The clients of management gurus are buying a promise. This is presented in
the article as another indicator of parallels with witchcraft. In fact, most
services (e.g., hairdressing, house repairs, legal services, marketing, etc.)
involve buying a hope (or promise).
The examples of reverse logic presented in the article are not very evident. For
example, smiling shop assistants may (and do) have a real positive effect on
customer satisfaction: customers are not pure rational beings, and a smile has
value per se. Similarly HRM is not just
performing actions similar to the desired outcome – rather it has (when
implemented) a real effect on employee attitudes, motivation and behaviour,
because employees are not rational beings needing rational treatment. In
addition, the “reverse logic” may also be in fact rational if the “optimal”
action and the desired effect are interdependent (e.g. medical doctors know
that optimism is instrumental to healing, although it may seem as the desired
state resulting from healing).
Clark and Salaman (1996) mention that symbols
and parables are often used to convey their messages. But in fact symbols,
parables and metaphors are usually the most effective way the “high”
cutting-edge ideas can be conveyed to managers with certainty (persuasion)
without having to teach them for several decades the managerial knowledge that
guru has learned. Yes, those symbols and maxims are usually intangible
exaggerations, but they do perform their job – attract attention of the people
in the organisation, mobilise, give confidence and hope, which later may lead
to a tangible success (i.e., attainment of organisation’s goals). Nonaka (1991)
has argued that for a knowledge creating organisation, it is necessary to
release the creativity of the managers and employees through vague definitions,
constraints and symbolic guidelines. He shows how symbols and slogans have been
used in managing change and creativity to achieve tremendous success in some
Japanese companies.
3 Extending the Metaphor
We have discussed the magic of management guru
performances and their similarities to witchdoctors. Now we are going to
discuss the possibilities to extend the parable to all management consultants
and the four distinct characteristics of magicians mentioned above. Even if
some of the characteristics of management gurus are common for other groups of
consultants, most of the ones that have initiated drawing parallels with
witchdoctors though do not apply to consultants as a group.
Clark and Salaman (1996) have deliberately
distinguished gurus from other management consultants because their intention
was not to include all management consultants in their discussion. There are
differences between guru’s work and performance and that of other management
consultants. However there might be occasions where their performance is
similar. When a consultant gets a new assignment he might be met with biased
attitudes from the client, ranging from suspicion to exaggeration of their
helping role (Schein 1969), depending on earlier experiences from consultants
or word of mouth. Then he/she must deal with the client’s feelings and
attitudes. It is not enough to have
rational arguments to change the feelings and attitudes of the client. Because
of these aspects of consulting, management consultants may need to use the
methods of magicians, for example charm, attraction, influence, tricks and
specific social skills.
There are different models of
client-consultant relationship. Tilles (1961) and Schein (1969) mention for
example the role of “business doctors” dispensing cures for the organisation
(usually in fact dealing with the worries of senior managers) and Nees & Greiner
(1985) distinguish management consultant roles like mental adventurer, strategy
navigator, management physicians, system architect and friendly co-pilot. These
roles suggest that management consultants really do possess a kind of unusual
power, embodied in their knowledge and systems. Sometimes (especially in the
doctor-patient model) the managers may subconsciously rely on management
consultants as “magicians” who can influence luck, or other factors behind the
managers’ control. Actually those names are just flattering the consultant. But
at the same time these highlights the professional status of management
consultants and enhance the expectations of what they can perform.
If a company hires management consultants, the
effects can sometimes be “magical”. Since the value of consulting assignments
and of consultant job in general is difficult to measure, (Delany 1995)), it is
not really possible to assess the extent of “magic” added to the company value.
Moreover, the consultant firms themselves are generally not interested in
measuring the value of their work (ibid.). As shown by the hardly
representative study done by Solomon (1997), consultants do have an effect on
the stock price. However, the value of the company stocks may get higher due to
psychological factors (Solomon 1997), and this can be described as “magic”.
The method of guru work and that of management
consultants is very different. Consultants usually work in teams while
management gurus are always solo artists, performers, stars – just like magicians, witchdoctors. The guru work is
relatively short and mostly conveyed through verbal communication, however
other types of consultants usually produce tangible reports, are engaged for a
lengthier time period with an assignment. Especially this is true for process
consultants (Delany 1995). A management guru can justify a higher fee for their
appearance and they are also met with more reverential treatment than other
consultants, but in fact most consultants charge premium fees, greatly explained
by some “magic” or “mystique” in their work (Clark and Salaman 1996, Delany
1995). In fact, the process consultants described by Schein (1969) and (Delany
1995) can be more considered “magicians” in that they influence the processes
(including cognitive processes) of the organisation. Their service is more
intangible and their expertise is not always rational.
4 Conclusions
Briefly our answer to the topic question is
negative. Management consultants in general cannot be considered magicians,
although management gurus (as part of management consultants) are operating
greatly like witchdoctors. However one should note the definitions behind this
statement. We would like to suspend the normative content often associated with
the words “magician” (one who makes magic, miraculous things happen) and
“witchdoctor”(a fraud pretending to control forces he/she doesn’t). Our
definitions are free of normative content and do not say anything about value
consultants create for organisations.
1. M. Kubr (1996) Management
Consulting. A Guide to the Profession. International Labour Office, Geneva.
2. Edgar H. Schein (1969) What is
Process Consultation? Process Consultation. (1988) Addison-Vesley
3. Ed Delany (1995) Strategy
Consultants – Do They Add Value? Elsevier Science Ltd.
4. Andrew L. Solomon (1997) Do
Consultants Really Add Value to Client Firms? Business Horizons May/June
1997 Vol.40 Issue 3
5. Timothy Clark and Graeme Salaman (1996) The Management Guru as Organizational Witchdoctor Organization
Studies 1996 Vol.3
6. Ikurijo Nonaka. (1991) The
Knowledge-Creating Company. Harvard Business Review November-December 1991
7. WWWebster Dictionary. Merriam-Webster Online.
http://www.m-w.com/home.htm
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