Business cynicism toward management theories and organizational change

¶ … Management Theory Brings the Best Process for Change?

In these times of economic sluggishness - a period in which corporations face the grim realities of shrinking profits, restructuring, layoffs, cutbacks, downsizing, and overall belt-tightening - it would nonetheless seem to be an ideal time for rethinking / retooling a corporation's theory of management. And, what better time than during times of economic stagnation - when companies decide which workers to lay off and which employees to keep - to forge theories and policies that better prepare the corporation for future good times and bad times? Management theories that not only accept change, and plan for change, but theories that facilitate the process of change, would seem to be most applicable to today's gloomy economic landscape.

Meanwhile, new approaches and theories which potentially promote positive change - and could be beneficial to companies - are sometimes rejected just because they are misunderstood or untested, and that is too bad, Financial Times writer Simon London notes in a recent column (Business Day, 2003): "Not all new business ideas should be dismissed out of hand as nothing more than proto fads," he says. "If you accept this point-of-view," London continues, "today's pervasive cynicism about management theory starts to look just as damaging as yesterday's childlike credulity."

Abercrombie & Fitch, Sex, and Cynicism

Is there really a sense of pervasive cynicism in the business community towards management theories? Is it because so many theories have come and gone, like Spring fashions that look tired and outdated by the following year? What has happened to the myriad theories like Business Change Management, Business Performance Management, Business Process Reengineering (BPR), Six Sigma, Workflow, Orchestration, Composite Applications, Web Services Choreography, the Real-Time Enterprise, Agility, Systems Dynamics (Smith, Fingar, 2002)? Are these now just catch phrases, theories and terms that have been used and cast aside, or just did they each just fade away when the next new trendy cycle of theories evolved? Perhaps cynicism does exist, and can be justified, given the above-mention litany of theories, and given the hard times faced in 2003.

Certainly, there are some cynical management theories currently extolled and practiced by certain retailers, such as fast-growing international company, Abercrombie & Fitch (A&F) - who place style over substance, sexiness over competence and ability. Indeed, a recent article in the New York Times (Greenhouse, 2003) points out that A&F's management theory, when it comes to staffing, entails an "aggressive approach to building a pretty and handsome sales force, an effort that company officials proudly acknowledge." A former assistant store manager for A&F, Antonio Serrano, is quoted as saying that A&F management "thought if we had the best-looking college kids working in our store, everyone will want to shop there." He went on: "If someone came in with a pretty face, we were told to approach them and ask them if they wanted a job." And the practice of hiring based on good looks - though potentially discriminatory against average-looking applicants and employees - is not unique to A&F, the Times' article asserts. "From Abercrombie to the cosmetics giant L'Oreal, from the sleek W. hotel chain to the Gap, businesses are openly seeking workers who are sexy, sleek or simply good-looking." So, the theory is that a sexy sales staff will help build branding, and help build the business, even in tough economic times? Give me a gorgeous blue-eyed babe who looks great in a sweater, has a nice tiny waistline and features charms that bedazzle any man walking into the store, and business will come bustling through the door in waves of males with wads of money? That seems desperate and shallow. And there already is one lawsuit against A&F, filed in Federal District Court in San Francisco, by Hispanic, Asian, and African-American applicants; they claim that they were offered positions in the stockroom, but not the sales floor. Some defend A&F's "beauty first" theory, like Marshal Cohen, a senior industry analyst with the market research firm, NPD group. "Being able to find a brand enhancer, or what I call a walking billboard, is critical...a guy wants to go hang out in a store where he can see good-looking gals."

And, albeit a superficial theory to be used when marketing a retail brand, the A&F philosophy of hiring gorgeous-looking women apparently works for young men, such as high school senior Matthew Sheehey, from Chicago: "If you see an attractive person working in the store wearing Abercrombie clothes, it makes you want to wear it, too," he said in the Times article. On the A&F Web site: (http://www.abercrombie.com/),one finds a shirtless, attractive man, wearing Abercrombie pants, and a nude, very attractive woman, wearing a huge smile, with her long wavy hair partially covering her right breast. Is this approach the wave of the retail future? Or a theory-based too much on base instincts? Actually, this theory of sexiness may be properly placed in the category of "Impression Management Theory" (Mendenhall & Wiley, 1994) - which is, the tendency to present oneself (or one's product) in a socially desirable way to others. And if it shows her bottom, will it also show a better bottom line?

Conclusion

The idea of a company's IT group working in solid sync with that company's innovative strategies / processes department, to create meaningful change at the drop of a hat, is almost too good. Technical people and idea development people have been, too often, more like gasoline and matches than oranges and apples. But, on the other hand, GE is a real-world situation with inspiring sidebar stories. And Smith and Fingar have obviously done their homework. So, the BPM can perhaps become a breath of fresh air - and fresh capital - for companies still burdened down with "Workflow" and "Business Change Management" theories. "Like the Hubble Telescope peering back into the origins of the universe," Smith and Fingar write, "business processes are the fundamental basic building blocks that have so far been hidden and shrouded in theory and technology. Today, however, they can and must be made visible, explicit and transparent..."