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Comment The Five Minds of a Manager EssayThe Five Minds of a Manager the five aspects of the managerial mindhas proved non only powerful in the classroom notwithstanding brainwaveful in practice, as we promise to demonstrate in this article. Well first explain how we came up with the five managerial mind- focalises, then well discuss each in some depth before reason out with the case for interweaving the five. The Five Managerial Mind-Sets Jonathan Gosling is the director of the Centre for Leadership Studies at the University of Exeter in Exeter, England. Henry Mintzberg is the Cleghorn Professor of Management Studies at McGill University in Montreal and the authorof the extroverted book Managers Not MBAs from Berrett-Koehler. The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, headquartered in Geneva, has a solicitude development concern. It worries that it may be adrift(p) too far toward a fast-action culture. It knows that it must act quickly in respo nding to disasters everywhereearthquakes and wars, floods and faminesbut it also sees the need to engage in the slack uper, more subdued task of building a capacity for action that is careful, thoughtful, and tailored to local conditions and needs.Many line of products organizations face a similar problemthey know how to execute, but they are not so adept at stepping back to confer on their situations. Others face the opposite predicament They bum around so mired in thinking about their problems that they throw outt get things done fast enough. We all know bureaucracies that are great at planning and organizing but slow to respond to market forces, just as were all acquainted with the nimble companies that react to every stimulus, but sloppily, and lay down to be constantly fastness things. And then, of course, there are those that suffer from bothafflictionsfor example, firms whose marketing departments are absorbed with grand positioning statements while their sales forces chase every possible deal. Those devil aspects establish the bounds of management Everything that every effective manager does is sandwiched between action on the ground and reflection in the abstract. Action without reflection is unthoughtful reflection without action is passive. Every manager has to find a way to combine these two mindsetsto function at the point where reflective thinking live up tos realistic doing. But action and reflection about what? Oneobvious answer is about collaboration, about getting things done cooperatively with other peoplein negotiations, for example, where a manager cannot act alone. Another answer is that action, reflection, and collaboration nominate to be rooted in a deep appreciation of reality harvard business review november 2003 in all its facets. We call this mind-set lay, which the Oxford English Dictionary defines as experienced in life, sophisticated, practical. Finally, action, reflection, and collaboration, as well as gentleman s gentlemanliness, must plump for to a certain rationality or logic they rely on an analyticmind-set, too. So we have five sets of the managerial mind, five ways in which managers interpret and deal with the world around them. Each has a dominant subject, or target, of its own. For reflection, the subject is the self there can be no insight without self-knowledge. Collaboration takes the subject beyond the self, into the managers network of relationships. Analysis goes a step beyond that, to the organization organizations depend on the systematic rot of activities, and thats what analysis is all about. Beyond the organization lies what we consider the subject of the worldlymind-set, namely contextthe worlds around the organization. Finally, the action mind-set pulls everything together finished the process of changein self, relationships, organization, and context. The practice of managing, then, involves five perspectives, which correspond to the five modules of our program Man aging self the reflective mind-set Managing organizations the analytic mind-set Managing context the worldly mind-set Managing relationships the collaborative mind-set Managing change the action mind-set If you are a manager, this is your world Let us go clear several characteristics ofthis set of sets. First, we make no claim that our embodimentwork is either scientific or comprehensive. It simply has proved commitful in our work with managers, including in our masters program. (For more on the program, see the sidebar Mind-Sets for Management Development. ) Second, we ask you to consider each of these managerial mind-sets as an attitude, a frame of mind that opens new vistas. Unless you get into a reflective frame of mind, for example, you cannot open yourself to new ideas. You might not even notice such ideas in the first place without a worldly frame of mind. And, of course, you cannot appreciate thebuzz, the vistas, and the opportunities of actions unless you engage in t hem. Third, a word on our word mind-sets. We page 2 The Five Minds of a Manager do not use it to set any managers mind. All of us have had more than enough of that. Rather, we use the word in the spirit of a wad one of us happened to pull out of a Chinese cookie recently Get your mind set. Confidence will lead you on. We ask you to get your mind set around five key ideas. Then, not just confidence but coherence can lead you on. Think, too, of these mind-sets as mind-sightsperspectives. But be aware that, improperly used, they can also be mine sites.Too much of any of themobsessive analyzing or compulsive collaborating, for instanceand the mind-set can blow up in your face. Managing Self The Reflective Mind-Set Managers who are sent off to development courses these days often find themselves being welcomed to guardianship camp. This is no country club, they are warned youll have to work hard. But this is wrongheaded. While managers certainly dont need a country club airwave for development, neither do they need boot camp. Most managers we know already live boot camp every day. Besides, in real boot camps, soldiers arrest to march and obey, notto grasp and think. These days, what managers desperately need is to stop and think, to step back and reflect thoughtfully on their experiences. Indeed, in his book Rules for Radicals, Saul Alinsky makes the enkindle point that events, or happenings, become experience only after they have been reflected upon thoughtfully Most people do not accumulate a consistency of experience. Most people go through life undergoing a series of happenings, which pass through their systems undigested. Happenings become experiences when they are digested, when they are reflected on, related to general patterns, and synthesized. Unless the substance is understood, managing is mindless. Hence we take reflection to be that space suspended between experience and explanation, where the mind makes the connections. Imagine yourself in a meeting when someone unawares erupts with a personal rant. Youre tempted to ignore or dismiss the outburstyouve heard, after all, that the person is having problems at home. But why not use it to reflect on your own reactionwhether em- Mind-Sets for Management Development In 1996, when we founded the International Masters Program in Practicing Management with colleagues from around the world, wedeveloped the managerial mind-sets as a new way to structure management education and development. Managers are sent to the IMPM by their companies, preferably in groups of four or five. They stay on the job, coming into our classrooms for five modules of two weeks each, one for each of the mindsets, over a period of 16 months. We open with a module on the reflective mind-set. The module is located at Lancaster University in the reflective atmosphere of northern Englandthe nearby hills and lakes inspire reflection on the purpose of life and work. Then it is on to McGill University inMontre al, where the grid-like regularity of the city reflects the energy and order of the analytic mind-set. The worldly mind-set on context comes alive at the Indian Institute of Management in Bangalore, where new technologies jostle ancient traditions on the crowded streets. Then comes the collabora- harvard business review november 2003 tive mind-set, hosted by faculty in Japan, where collaboration has been the key to managerial innovations, and Korea, where alliances and partnerships have become the basis for business growth. Last is the action mind-set module, located at Insead in France,where emerging trends from around the world convert into lessons for managerial action. So our locations not only teach the mindsets but also encourage the alive(p) managers to live them. And so have we, in the very conception of the program. Our approach to management development is fundamentally reflective. We believe managers need to step back from the pressures of their jobs and reflect thought fully on their experiences. We as faculty members bring concepts the participants bring experience. Learning occurs where these meetin individual heads, small groups, and all together.Our 50-50 rule says that half the classroom time should be turned over to the participants, on their agendas. The program is fully collaborative all around. There is no lead school much of the organizational responsibility is distributed. Likewise, the facultys relationship with the participants is collaborative. And faculty members work closely with the participating companies, which over the past eight years have included Alcan, BT, EDF Group and Gaz de France, Fujitsu, the International Red Cross Federation, LG, Lufthansa, Matsushita, Motorola, Royal Bank of Canada, and Zeneca. We think of our setting as being especiallyworldly, because the participating managers and faculty host their colleagues at home, in their own cultures, and are guests abroad. We also believe that the programs reflective pen chant allows us to probe into analysis more deeply than in regular education and work. Finally, our own purpose is action We seek fundamental change in management education worldwideto help change business schools into true schools of management. page 3 The Five Minds of a Manager These days, what managers desperately need is to stop and thinkto step back and reflect thoughtfully on their experiences.barrassment, anger, or frustrationand so recognize some comparable feelings in yourself? Your own reaction now becomes a learning experience for you You have opened a space for imagination, between your experience and your explanation. It can make all the difference. Organizations may not need mirror people, who see in everything only reflections of their own behavior. But neither do they need window people, who cannot see beyond the images in bowel movement of them. They need managers who see both waysin a sense, ones who look out the window at dawn, to see through their own reflectio ns to the awakening world outside.Reflect in Latin means to refold, which suggests that attention turns inward so that it can be turned outward. This means going beyond introspection. It means flavour in so that you can better see out in order to perceive a familiar thing in a diametric waya product as a service, maybe, or a customer as a partner. Does that not describe the thinking of the really thriving managers, the Andy Groves of the world? Compare such people with the Messiers and Lays, who dazzle with great mergers and grand strategies before burning out their companies. Likewise, reflective managers are able to see bunghole in order to look ahead.Successful visions are not immaculately conceived they are painted, stroke by stroke, out of the experiences of the past. Reflective managers, in other words, have a healthy respect for historynot just the grand history of deals and disasters but also the everyday history of all the little actions that make organizations work. Co nsider in this regard Kofi Annans deep personal understanding of the United Nations, a comprehension that has been the source of his ability to help move that multiform body to a different and better place. You must appreciate the past if you wish to use the present to get to a better future.