Sumantra Ghoshal on Management: A Force for Good

Chapter 1. Towards a good theory of management

<authorgroup>Sumantra Ghoshal and Peter Moran</authorgroup>

This is one of Sumantra’s final papers, and also one of his most ambitious. It builds on many of his earlier papers, especially in its critique of traditional organizational theory, but it pushes the argument further by spelling out the role played by business schools in disseminating “bad” theory. In this paper, Sumantra and Peter Moran argue that many theories – from transaction cost economics to Michael Porter’s “five forces” – have influenced management practice for the worse. Far from being irrelevant or obscure, such theories have profoundly influenced the behavior and beliefs of an entire generation of managers. And while these theories ...