Analysis
Someone once said—probably it was Mr. Schwab—that given the right organization it was no harder to manage the U. S. Steel Corporation than to operate a peanut stand.
And Mr. Schwab ought to know, although no life-sized portrait of him all dressed up like a peanut vendor has ever been brought to our attention.
However that may be, his statement is interesting—especially interesting because his appraisal of the job of managing very nearly approaches ours. In "The Knack of Managing," you see, much of the emphasis will be on the fact that the fundamental PRINCIPLES OF MANAGEMENT apply to every business alike. And if we may start out with the premise that managing Mr. Schwab's Bethlehem Steel Company is not such a far cry from operating a pretzel plant or a furniture factory, our battle is already half won.
THE PRINCIPLES OF MANAGEMENT vary not at all, however different may be the MECHANICS OF APPLICATION.
How often the editor, how often the equipment salesman, listens to that time-worn tale of woe: "My business is different. So-and-so can do that sort of thing. But I make gadgets—and your conveyors, your air conditioners or whatever it is you write about or sell, won't do me a bit of good."
Of course his business is different—different in its individual characteristics, its financial, sales, production, labor problems. But they are only the CLOTHES the business wears. They may differ from the clothes of another enterprise as widely as the frilly importation from the Rue de la Paix differs from the sleazy issue of the East Side sweat shop. But underneath the clothes the artist knows there is the human body—and a study of anatomy is necessary before he can paint the picture. Beneath the "clothes" of the business are the principles of management—The ANATOMY OF MANAGEMENT—the framework upon which the completed structure is built.
Doesn't it all boil down to something like the Colonel's lady and Judy O'Grady? One, presumably, wore a brief peignoir with a Paris label; the other, a substantial bungalow apron from a department store basement. But weren't they "sisters under the skin"?
Stripped of all the furbelows—the details of operation, of tools, of materials—the objectives of our steel master, our peanut vendor, our pretzel maker, our furniture manufacturer, are one and the same thing. Their every-day job, in short, is to get something well done with maximum dispatch and at minimum expense.
That's management's job. It goes for every type of enterprise; whether it involves the use of a million dollars' capital, or only ten cents' carfare—or a few minutes of a man's time. The "clothes" matter not at all. Beneath them the fundamental steps in managing are identical. The basic KNACK OF MANAGING is the same.