Role Of Management Consultants Research Articles

McKinsey auf der Hardthöhe: Unternehmensberater im Bundesministerium der Verteidigung 1981/82

Abstract This paper examines the use of management consultants in the German Ministry of Defence in 1981 and 1982. After an affair concerning the procurement of the Tornado fighter aircraft, the Minister of Defence, Hans Apel, hired a team from the consulting firm McKinsey to develop a new organisational concept. This paper examines the special features of the German procurement and defence administration as well as the reasons for the failure of projects of administrative innovation. Focus is placed on the role of management consultants in the implementation of organisational innovations and their relationship to the actors within the ministerial administration.

McKinsey and the 'Tripartite Monster': The Role of Management Consultants in the 1974 NHS Reorganisation.

The first major reorganisation of the National Health Service took place in 1974, twenty-six years after the service had been established. It has long been perceived as a failure. This article draws on archival records and a witness seminar held in November 2016 to provide a more nuanced assessment of the 1974 reorganisation and understand more fully why it took the form that it did. In particular it identifies the reorganisation as an important moment in the ongoing story of management consultants engaging with health policymakers, and explores the role of McKinsey and Co. in detail for the first time. Key explanatory factors for their involvement are identified, including the perceived lack of expertise and manpower inside the civil service and the NHS, and perceptions of their impact and effectiveness are discussed. Many debates about the use of management consultants today were directly foreshadowed during the early 1970s. Alongside this, the role of other groups of policy actors, including civil servants, politicians and medical professionals, are established and the extent to which British health policymakers have had to work within existing cultural, political, legislative and practical constraints when trying to initiate change is demonstrated. The fact that many of the 'mistakes' that were made have been repeated in the course of subsequent reforms, speaks to the poor institutional memory of Whitehall, and the Department of Health and Social Care in particular. In the run up to 1974 management consultants could make only a limited contribution to an imperfect compromise.

DEVELOPING CORPORATE RESILIENCE IN NIGERIAN SMEs: THE ROLE OF MANAGEMENT CONSULTANTS IN SOUTHERN NIGERIA

this paper focused on developing corporate resilience in Nigerian SMEs: the role of management consultants in southern Nigeria. The paper adopted survey approach and the major instrument for data collection was a five point likert scale questionnaire. The data gathered was analyzed with t-test using the 20.0 version of the statistical package for social sciences (SPSS) at 0.05 level of significance. The study covered a population of 512 persons which consists of 112 management consultants and 400 management staff of 60 selected SMEs from Enugu, Imo and Rivers-state. The researchers used the Yaro Yamene’s method to select a sample size of 225 persons. It was concluded in this paper that SMEs should develop resilience drive in their business approaches. The study found that due to dearth of resources and internal capabilities, there is need for SMEs to leverage on the services of management consultants. The p-value shows a 0.001 and 0.002 outputs, which reflects the significant contributions management consultants can make to the development of resilience in SMEs in turbulent times. This paper therefore recommends among others that state governments in southern Nigeria should provide business resilience targeted trainings to managers and owners of SMEs in order to prepare them with relevant and current knowledge that can guide their operations.

Consulting University: A Reflection from Inside

AbstractThis paper contributes to a growing literature on the role of management consultants in the public sector by examining a sensitive area of management consulting, as exercised by university faculty members and as applied to universities. It frames the development of management consulting as an idea that originated in universities, travelled first into the private sector and then into the public sector, from country to country, and was eventually applied to universities – with problematic effects.

Putting AIM in context

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to critically review the relationship between management research and practice particularly in the UK.Design/methodology/approachThe paper takes the form of an historical survey of initiatives and different conceptual approaches.FindingsThe paper reveals a central focus on the role of management consultants in mediating between management practice and management knowledge,Research limitations/implicationsThe paper is a partial and limited analysis of a complex process: more work is needed to untangle the various institutional roles and conceptual frameworks.Practical implicationsRe‐framing the relationship between management research and practice to consider a greater emphasis on practice engaged scholarship and the two way process of knowledge translation.Originality/valueThe paper encourages a new perspective amongst policy makers, researchers and management consultants.

New Public Management: The Cruellest Invention of the Human Spirit?1

This article examines one of the most significant phenomena of the late twentieth and early twenty‐first centuries—the emergence of New Public Management (NPM). NPM has been widely adopted, internationally. However, its adoption is based on governments having faith in its deployment to transform their public sectors using private sector performance criteria. In this article, the case is advanced that the widespread use of NPM is often a cruel disappointment for governments. This is demonstrated by focusing on four key elements of NPM, as practised in the early twenty‐first century—the role of management consultants, the development of e‐government, the emergence of the ‘audit society’ and the increasing importance of risk management.

From Flexibility to Work-Life Balance: Exploring the Changing Discourses of Management Consultants

What is the role of management consultants in the diffusion of fashionable ideas? This paper addresses this question by drawing on an ethnographic study of management consultants in the UK. The study examined how the consultants made sense of a newly emerging discourse of work-life balance. Using the metaphor of a `bandwagon', the study reveals the shifting interpretations of the work-life balance discourse as the consultants found themselves `riding alongside', `cashing in', `steering', `steering clear of' and `falling off' the bandwagon. These findings question the idea that fashion-setters always `jump on' to fashion bandwagons, thereby acting as passive channels in the diffusion of popular discourses. Instead, the study highlights the similarities between fashion-setters and their audiences in the reflexive and strategic ways in which discourses can be interpreted, enacted and appropriated.

An Unexplored Relationship: Australian Management Consulting and the Management of Human Resources

Over the last two decades management consulting has enjoyed phenomenal growth and expansion; however, the activities and influence of consultants remain largely unexplored. This paper examines the relationship between the burgeoning management consulting industry and the management of human resources in Australia. Using a broad definition of 'human resource consult ing', the paper argues that the role of management consultants in human resource management has expanded significantly. The AWIRS 95 survey is used to examine factors affecting the use of consultants in employee relations. The findings suggest that consultants are more likely to be engaged by larger, overseas-owned workplaces, at head-office level, and in establishments seeking to improve productivity and employee relations. The data also suggest a possible link between the use of consultants and the outsourcing of elements of the human resource function.