When you study management, you find that there are several ways to success and several ways to failure. When a manager tells me that a certain system has more advantages than the other system while it has some disadvantages, I say to myself “He knows about management”. However, many times I find people that think that there is one way to success or that certain way will lead to failure no matter what else you do. The reasons for the erroneous conclusions are:
- I did it and succeeded so it is the only way to success, or it cannot lead to failure, or any other way will lead to failure. Well, you are a sample of one…is this a sample? Your case is just one case which can be used to make such conclusion. Even if you did it several times in few circumstances, you cannot make such judgment because simply may be you know how to successfully apply that system and you usually apply the strategies that make this system succeed.
- I read this way in the book of the chairman or the CEO of the multinational great company, so this is the only way to succeed. Again, this chairman is telling you about his own experience which were applied in certain circumstances and he/she did other things to support that strategy or decision. Not every case will be like his/her case.
- This strategy or policy is being applied in the most developed countries, thus every company needs to apply the same strategy to succeed. Assuming the previous statement is right, then what are other strategies that are applied there? what are there goals?, what is the work culture there?, what is the work environment?
- All management practices that are applied in country X cannot succeed in country Y because people there are different. Ok, then people in country X cannot eat anything that people in country Y eat. People in country X cannot read in the same way they do on country Y. Yes, some practices succeed in country X but may not succeed in country Y; however, we cannot make a general conclusion that whatever succeed there cannot succeed here.
One of the valuable things you get from the research is that it tells you that based on a large sample of companies, it was found that so and so help companies improve their profitability, for example. It also tells you that it was found that certain strategies succeed in certain conditions. Based on those findings, you can analyze your case and find the best way to succeed in your own and may be unique case. So, the research gives you general guidelines which are better that those erroneous conclusions.
