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"Knowledge comes, but wisdom
lingers."
—Alfred Lord Tennyson
We are told that a wise counselor judges things as they are, not as they are said or acclaimed to be.
Suppose it were
necessary to sum up the life and works of Irish-born author and social
philosopher Charles Handy, who passed on December 13, 2024, at 92. His mission, simply stated, was to get top management to question conventional wisdom and consider the moral implications of their strategies.
Handy's disciplines included choosing his words carefully.
"... he employed the Socratic method of inquiry to learn about those seeking help and the nature of their problems."
A Fortune magazine article published on October 31, 1994, was retrieved. That six-page cover story with photos gives the reader a close look at Oxford and MIT-educated Charles Handy's
thinking, at least to the age of 62.
Adding another 30 years of advising diverse groups, such as PepsiCo, BP, Silicon Valley start-ups, and the Save the Children's Foundation, means that more than half a century of sound management thought has been shared privately and publicly in Handy's 23 books.
An engagement with Charles Handy, the son of a Protestant clergyman and the only layman to deliver a religious Thought for the Day on the BBC, began with a required visit to his 19th-century apartment in suburban southwest London. There, he employed the Socratic method of inquiry to learn about those seeking help and the nature of their problems.
Discontinuous
thinking
The Age of
Unreason was
my first Charles Handy book, and it was filled with fresh ideas. Published in 1989, it forecasted faster and more unpredictable change, which would materialize in the form of the
internet, terrorism, smartphones, the COVID-19 pandemic, and artificial
intelligence.
In his
"shamrock organization," Handy envisioned a corporate headquarters that would shrink, with more tasks outsourced. The shamrock design has three types of
workers: a core of permanent employees, a group of contract workers, and a
flexible labor force. The criticism is that flexible but casual workforces
often lack the discipline of on-site supervision and exhibit a loss of
corporate culture.
Handy also foresaw
that associates may not stay with one company for a lifetime but would have a "portfolio"
of experiences, including entrepreneurial opportunities.
"My job is to be ten years ahead, which is why many people tend to say I'm stupid," says Handy to Fortune reporter Carla Rapoport. How do you associate a self-disparaging term with someone who sold two million books and commanded respect and high fees from global clients?
Yet, Charles Handy admitted to making mistakes throughout his career.
That learning process would culminate in "decent doubt" and being open to the possibility of wrong decisions and alternative perspectives. Handy believed that questioning one's assumptions helps reduce the impact of potential mistakes.
His teaching used
management metaphors. For example, the sloping lines of a sigmoid curve indicate that companies will eventually fail if they do not adapt and reinvent themselves during
good times.
The book brought
Handy to the attention of leaders everywhere. He believed that discontinuous
change necessitated discontinuous thinking about profound social and economic shifts, and that the past was an unreliable guide for navigating what comes
next.
A designed future
The New York Times obituary highlighted how Handy
envisioned decentralized, community-oriented "federal organizations"
in which a small corporate headquarters served the needs of diverse and
far-flung business units. The corporate center would retain key financial
control, while the creative and production energy would be centered among workers close to
the customers.
Handy taught that corporations should be viewed as communities of individuals who need to be nurtured and inspired by a worthy purpose, rather than machines to be re-engineered. Getting bigger didn't have to be the goal; getting better was enough.
"I truly believe that managing people, instead of leading them, is wrong ..."
"Why are
villages and platoons better than mass organizations? Because they are human
scale. They allow you to be a person, not a cog. Already, young people are
turning away from the traditional pyramid organizations in which you clamber
your way up the hierarchy over the years. The world of work is increasingly
going to realize that small is better," said Handy at age 87, writing to
his four grandchildren in 21 Letters on Life and Its Challenges.
The purpose of the book was to help them with life's choices.
What didn't he do?
Handy said he struggled
with management responsibilities while working at Shell. That may explain why the one
thing he couldn't do was teach people to manage. That would only come with
practice, if at all.
"I truly believe that managing people, instead of leading them, is wrong and has resulted in too many dysfunctional and unhappy workplaces. People are more than a human resource," Handy wrote in 21 Letters.
He also
avoided prescribing behavior. "In most human situations, there is no
textbook answer. You have to make your own judgments most of the
time," Handy observed.
Upon further reflection
Charles Handy said the following—
- Steer clear of consultants. No
one is better qualified to solve your problems than you.
- Retirement should be banned. Society can't afford it.
- Language can trick you into
believing in ways you would normally avoid. Words are devious, dangerous
things. Always watch your language lest you send messages that you never
intended.
- Progress depends on unreasonable
people, for they are the ones who try to change the world, while
reasonable people adapt to it.
A favorite Handy quote:
"The companies that survive the longest are the ones that work out what they uniquely can give to the world—not just growth or money but their excellence, respect for others, and ability to make people happy. Some call those things a soul."
A loss of light and love
In 1960, at a party in Kuala Lumpur, Charles Handy met his future wife, Elizabeth Ann Hill, who worked for the British High Commission in Singapore. She became a successful professional photographer, Mr. Handy's agent, and business manager.
In 2018, Elizabeth Handy was killed in
an automobile accident in Norfolk County, England. Mr. Handy was driving their
car.
Strategist.com
©
Bredholt & Co.
