TITLE : IDEAS FOR ENTERPRISING MANAGERS.

An 'enterprising' manager is one who is never entirely content with the status quo. He is always looking for new ideas to improve his own performance and that of his staff.

But he has little time to spare for reading long and highly specialised textbooks.

In the earlier days, particularly throughout the 1960s and 1970s, an Organisation and Methods department could be found in virtually every medium to large company - and in some small ones as well. The 0 & M service provided support to line managers. Enterprising line managers would ask the 0 & M analysts to take a good look at their department, identify problems and come up with ideas. Every professional 0 & M department had a 'kit' of techniques and analytical methods which they used to support the line managers. Now that the 0 & M function has been largely superseded by the principle of managers taking full responsibility for the effectiveness of their departments, these techniques and methods have, to some extent, been forgotten. The modem tendency is for companies seeking ideas to employ the consulting side of a large firm of accountants to solve their problems. The result is that the only problems looked at are the corporat~ ones, which are obvious to top management, leaving the fine manager with little support. In addition, the accounting-orientated consultant is also likely to be accounts-orientated in the service he provides. Emphasis falls on the more esoteric areas of tax, financial planning, share issues, mergers and the like.

The ideas in this book - all tried and tested in real life - are designed to meet at least some of the more down-to-earth needs of the enterprising line manager - to give him a do-it-yourself kit for improving his own performance and that of his department.

The first chapter describes an overview approach focusing on the likely problems and opportunities for improvement. Whilst suggestions for action are given for each of the 14 areas suggested for examination, further detail and expansion of the ideas is given in subsequent chapters.

Each subsequent chapter covers a specific subject. Wherever the ideas are based on techniques, mathematical or otherwise, these techniques have been simplified so that the enterprising manager can achieve the optimum result, i.e. some useful action which is not prolonged or complicated by non-essential finer points.

The rather cumbersome practice of writing 'his or hers', 'him or her', 'he or she'has been left out for ease of reading. In all caees references to gender should be read as including both sexes.

Thanks are due to the magazine International Management for agreement to use modifications of articles which have appeared in the magazine for Chapters 8 and 20.