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The Management Myth: Debunking Modern Business Philosophy Paperback – August 16, 2010

by Matthew Stewart (Author)

62 customer reviews

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"A devastating bombardment of managerial thinking and the profession of management consulting…A serious and valuable polemic." ―Wall Street Journal

Fresh from Oxford with a degree in philosophy and no particular interest in business, Matthew Stewart might not have seemed a likely candidate to become a consultant. But soon he was telling veteran managers how to run their companies.

In narrating his own ill-fated (and often hilarious) odyssey at a top-tier firm, Stewart turns the consultant’s merciless, penetrating eye on the management industry itself. The Management Myth offers an insightful romp through the entire history of thinking about management, a withering critique of pseudoscience in management theory, and a clear explanation of why the MBA usually amounts to so much BS―leading us through the wilderness of American business thought.

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Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Stewart (The Courtier and the Heretic) reflects on his unconventional path to becoming a successful management consultant—despite a complete lack of business knowledge or experience, let alone an MBA. He offers an insider's perspective on the industry, revealing the astonishingly high routine consultant fees and the absurdity of leading firms depending on consultants fresh out of school to tell them how to run their business. Following in the footsteps of shamans, consultants envelop their work with an aura of sacred mystery and outrageously unjustified levels of self-confidence to add to their perceived expertise. Gleefully revealing the magician's tricks, Stewart takes readers on a whirlwind tour of how this industry came to be a powerhouse. Filled with fascinating insider anecdotes and featuring a who's who in the consulting world, including Peter Drucker, Michael Porter and Bruce Henderson, this wry, absorbing book will enlighten executives about the value consultants actually bring to their clients. (Aug.) --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

“Entertaining and slightly shocking.”
- Jill Lepore, The New Yorker

“Consistently entertaining and enlightening.”
- Harvard Business Review

“Gleefully revealing the magician’s tricks, Stewart takes readers on a whirlwind tour of how [the consulting] industry came to be a powerhouse. Filled with fascinating insider anecdotes and featuring a who’s who in the consulting world…this wry, absorbing book will enlighten executives about the value consultants actually bring to their clients.”
- Publishers Weekly

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Product details

Paperback: 352 pages
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company; Reprint edition (August 16, 2010)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0393338525
ISBN-13: 978-0393338522
Product Dimensions: 5.5 x 0.9 x 8.3 inches
Shipping Weight: 9.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
Average Customer Review: 62 customer reviews
Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #311,877 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #170 in Books > Business & Money > Small Business & Entrepreneurship > Consulting
- #273 in Books > Business & Money > Management & Leadership > Management Science
- #3358 in Books > Business & Money > Management & Leadership > Management

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Philosophy

4.0 out of 5 stars

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4.4 out of 5 stars

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4.6 out of 5 stars

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Krasi P. K.

Just Great

April 7, 2017

Format: HardcoverVerified Purchase

This is one of the best (if not the best) books on management. It is written by a philosopher, not by a management professor or a management guru. The main question is: Is management a science? The answer, according to Matthew Stewart, is no. All it takes for a manager to be a good manager is to be a good person. I used the book as a resources in my doctoral dissertation. It is a solid, well-written text.

Comment 8 people found this helpful. Was this review helpful to you?

Yes

R. Lundberg

A Must Read

June 22, 2015

Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase

Iconoclastic and insightful, this book alternates between a damning exposure of the so-called science of management and a biography of the author'e improbable career as a management consultant working for a consulting firm that betrayed the very principles it espoused and suffered the fitting denouement it deserved. He basically says there are only two valuable things a consultant can do for your company and these things are grossly overpriced. A type 1 consultant can show you where the Pareto 80/20 rule applies, and a type 2 consultant can show you how to cut costs without wrecking the company. He expounds at great length on the legendary figures and present day gurus of the management advice industry and shows that there is no there there. That great length is the only caveat about this book, I found myself skipping over some of the diatribes because of repetition, just as probably would read the works of Tom Peters or Peter Drucker. One other thing. He seems to believe that the 80/20 principle was an application of Pareto's Law that was popularized by the advent of management consultant firms, I know for a fact that we were using ABC target pricing and 80/20 customer analysis in the 60s, both Pareto based.

Comment 5 people found this helpful. Was this review helpful to you?

Yes

Hans Peter Bech

Insight and entertainment in one package.

January 15, 2018

Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase

I couldn't let it down. Very well written, funny and insightful. A modern version of the Emperor's New Clothes.

I have mainly worked with startups and we didn't engage management consulting firms to figure out how to build a business. Being the victim of a major merger around the turn of the century I was involved in defining a new modus operandi - a project lead by one of the major MC firms. I was not impressed.

As I started my own boutique MC company I learned that small league business executives are hungry for ways to cut corners, pluck the low hanging fruits, avoid risk (which you cannot) and find an easy way out. However, they are not prepared to pay much for consulting as they do not make much themselves. They are not impressed with the ivory league MC firms that they don't believe have any experience with the small business (and they are right).

Big league executives, on the other hand, love the ivory league MC firms and are prepared to pay the big bucks. It adds to the prestige of their positions that they are entitled to and can afford to hire them. But they are also expected to do so. I have worked as a consultant for some of the biggest companies on the globe and could only look with envy on the fees that the big boys could charge. Now I understand why that makes perfect sense and this book helped me fully understand the mechanics.

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Fab

Great analisys of the "science" of management

May 5, 2014

Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase

Through the story of his personal experience in consulting business, in few hundred pages Matthew gives us complete overview of what is called "science" of management, he shows us its fallacy, its rethoric and he demostrates how most of the concepts, framework that are taught in business school, all the literature of professors ( with and without PHD )like Taylor, Mayo, Drucker, Porter based on assumptions, anedoctes which derive from past facts with not proven efficacy. All the gurus who try to influence the middle management like Peters, Hamel, Covey just created a business around this fake science and they changed their vision and forecast ( mostly proven wrongs) book after book . No one can see the future and each business has its own nature, life and death like each human being and it cannot be put in a fixed and replicable framework. The conclusion of Matthew is that to be a good manager is simply a good educated and trusted person with ethics.

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Roy Ames

A very biased book - and that's a good thing.

January 5, 2013

Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase

An MBA obviously has worthwhile content including accounting and marketing, and the author could have tried to do more to separate what is useful from the fads and frauds that he is exposing. But that would have diluted his main point: consultants are there to take your money. The method is to hire very smart people, give them a template that supposedly applies to any business (so that you can't question their lack of experience in your business). Next is to create some scary graphs to justify further digging through your data. The final trick is not to have one, but to provide just the right amount of compelling content along the way to keep the money flowing to the partners of the consulting firm as long as possible. Who knew?

You might have suspected that this is how a business of claiming to know more about your business than you do might work. But you can see how it unfolds in chapters that alternate between the history of the gurus, starting with Taylor, and the author's own story from newbie to nominal partner. Obviously the author has his biases which are fully revealed, just as every reader does. But to the most unbiased person who wants to take into account an opposing viewpoint to the business of business consulting, this book is a good and entertaining read.

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András Puiz

It's thoroughly entertaining to read and raises some good points, yet I still feel the book fails ...

September 20, 2014

Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase

An interesting read, and a bit of an eye-opener. There are two "plots": the author's own experiences in the consulting business, and a historic overview of management philosophies, the latter in a very scathing, critical tone. It's thoroughly entertaining to read and raises some good points, yet I still feel the book fails to deliver on its promise. If it's set out to debunk the "management myth," it should do a bit more than take some caustic critiques of a bunch of hand-picked management experts from the past, and mix it with some first-hand anecdotes. In other words, the book offers limited coverage and does not jell perfectly, but is well written and insightful.

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Most recent customer reviews

Jonathan

Wonderful. Should inform the philosophy of a generation.

This is one of the most influential business book I have ever read. It was (ironically) recommended to me in 2009 or 2010 by my favorite business school professor (who also taught...Read more

Published 5 months ago

The only book with "management" in its title that won't make you dumber.

To be clear from the outset: this is not a management book. And it's not entirely a memoir. Rather, with finesse worthy of Bulgakov, Stewart weaves his misadventures in management...Read more

Published 9 months ago

Theuns Pelser

A must read for all in business

Matthew Stewart unpacks many of the so called fads in management today and yesteryear. It is obvious that a good manager has more in common with good virtues and character than...Read more

Published 10 months ago

Johan Troskie

Excellent

Putting words to what I believed for a long time. Raw and straight as an arrow. A very good read.

Published 1 year ago

Albert Mangels

More of Management Bashing?

There is a lot of truth told in the book based on my experience. But it's easier to tear down than to build up, and maybe there could have been more of the latter.

Published 1 year ago

Mads Stolberg-Larsen

Read it if you - like me - just got into the trade

I started working as a consultant half a year ago and this book is fun to read because it gives a perspective on the history of management thought, which is definitely not taught...Read more

Published 1 year ago

grumpy

Five Stars

great personal narrative & interesting history of management consulting.

Published 1 year ago

J Santiago

I love this book

Exceptional historical assessment of Frederick Winslow Taylor's "legacy," counter-balanced with modern strategic planning efforts.Read more

Published 1 year ago

alvaro gomez j

Four Stars

A refreshing and combative book! Opens your mind!

Published 1 year ago

Bill Meade

Smartest book I have read in 5 years

Impressive craft and originality in synthesizing a panoramic viewpoint. I bet the editor had a Herculean challenge in getting the author to use Plain English.Read more

Published 1 year ago

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