Training Tomorrow's Managers: A Note to Today's ManagersAuthor(s): Clay H. HollisterSource: Operations Research, Vol. 4, No. 4 (Aug., 1956), pp. 480-481Published by: INFORMSStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/167316 .

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480 Management's Corner

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10. G. CALABRESE, System Generation Reserve Requirements, prepared monograph submitted to the Subcommittee on the Application of Probability Methods to Power System Problems, July 9, 1953.

TRAINING TOMORROW'S MANAGERS: A NOTE TO TODAY'S MANAGERS

CLAY H. HOLLISTER Case Institute of Technology, Cleveland, Ohio

T HIS NOTE is directed to those managers who are likely to appreciate the fact that the practice of management is rapidly becoming the application of science

and technology to organizational problems; or put in other words, that manage- ment is becoming a technical profession.

The point to be made here is that an Operations Research Group in a company can provide an excellent training ground for tomorrow's professional managers. This idea may not be readily apparent, so let us close the gap left between manage- ment as a technical profession and management training in operations research.

With the advance of management toward a more technical profession, there is an increasing awareness of the need for better decisions on management problems. The day of the manager who operates a business of medium or large size purely as his own property is disappearing. And now, even when ownership in the enter- prise on the part of management groups is not substantial, there is little room left for a manager to indulge in the luxury of snap judgments or 'flying by the seat of his pants.'

There are certain trends that are promoting the development of these pro- fessionals in management. For example, it is quite apparent that complexities of business "and industry are increasing geometrically. Therefore, for each decision made, there are a great many more variables to be considered. Besides this in- creasing complexity, there is the fact that new techniques of gathering information both within and without companies are making enormous progress. It seems quite clear, then, that the professional manager will have to consider not only more variables, but he will have to incorporate systematically into his decisions much larger masses of data which will be available to him. When tomorrow's profes- sional manager comes to solve his problems, it is then clear that he will need far

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Clay H. Hollister 48 1

more sophisticated methods of measurement and evaluation than have been at his command in the past. For these reasons it has become desirable to transfer some of the known methods of science, and even scientific method itself, to prob- lems in business. Scientists and engineers have long been accustomed to working with many variables and trying to solve problems in which there are an extraordi- nary number of complexities. In endeavoring to solve these problems, many extremely useful techniques have been developed and can be transferred to useful applications in connection with industry and business.

Tomorrow's managers are going to need to know what can be done with these scientific techniques in connection with their own particular business, and it is the job of the Operations Research Group in any company to apply as many of these techniques as is possible to the particular problems of the company involved. Therefore, it would seem natural that if some of the younger men of high potential around the company are exposed to these new techniques as early as possible, they will be better able subsequently to operate on their jobs when they have heavier responsibilities. The fact that they will know exactly what can be done by the' use of these new scientific methods will then prove to be one great advantage of the use of the Operations Research Group as a training group for tomorrow's managers.

The other great advantage is that the operations-research viewpoint is based on producing the best results for an operation as a whole, whether it is a total company, a division, or a department. In every case where operations research is used to its fullest value, it can be shown that the answer affects many different units within the same business frame of reference, and, in so doing, comes up with answers which are best from an over-all viewpoint. It is the best-interest-of-the- total-operation attitude that leads the' young manager of tomorrow to begin to understand the interrelationship of the various groups within any particular business activity.

By understanding how the many elements interrelate within the company the judgment needed by tomorrow's managers is developed. Unfortunately, too many of today's jobs in companies tend to narrow down or specialize potential managers so that they have no real understanding of the integration of the different elements of functions within their company. If, therefore, young men of high promise are taken out of their somewhat specialized jobs for a period' of time and put in with the Operations Research Group, they learn not only some of the new and startling things which can be done in their company by the use of these newly applied scientific tools, but also they have an opportunity to look at the impact of different problems on the different elements of their business.

There are obviously pitfalls in any diversion of individuals in this way, if any feeling develops that those going into operations research for a training period have become the 'fair-haired boys.' Any such unfortunate connotation can be avoided by the proper handling of any assignments to work with the Operations Research Group within the company. This is really a matter that cannot be generalized from without, but has to be carefully planned within any individual company structure. However, remember that operations-research activities look to be among the best areas within a company for the training of tomorrow's top-managers.

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