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Marvin Bower Quotes

Marvin Bower was an American business theorist and management consultant.

✵ 1. August 1903 – 22. January 2003
Marvin Bower photo
Marvin Bower: 12   quotes 0   likes

Famous Marvin Bower Quotes

“The difference between a leadership and a command company can be very great indeed, because in a hierarchical situation, people who have concerns about reactions against themselves would simply not put forward negative information.”

Marvin Bower

Source: The Will to Manage (1966), p. 34

“I believe that in a leadership company most people will like their work. But the company will be an even more enjoyable place to work if the culture is designed to make it that way. Leading fosters a working atmosphere that stimulates an open exchange of ideas and fosters dissent. People should show a genuine concern for one another and treat one another with fairness, as peers and friends. With such an atmosphere it should be a pleasure to come to work.”

Marvin Bower

Source: The Will to Manage (1966), p. 131

“A business of high principle attracts high-caliber people more easily, thereby gaining a basic competitive and profit edge.”

Marvin Bower

Source: The Will to Manage (1966), p. 25

“The business with high ethical standards has three primary advantages over competitors whose standards are lower:”

Marvin Bower

A business of high principle generates greater drive and effectiveness because people know they can do the right thing decisively and with confidence. ...
A business of high principle attracts high-caliber people more easily, thereby gaining a basic competitive and profit edge. ...
A business of high principle develops better and more profitable relations with customers, competitors, and the general public, because it can be counted on to do the right thing at all times. By the consistently ethical character of its actions, it builds a favorable image.
Source: The Will to Manage (1966), p. 26

“I believe that leaders and leadership teams working together in a proper design will run the business more effectively than by hierarchical, command-and-control managing. But I can't prove that. And there are no models.”

Marvin Bower

Source: The Will to Manage (1966), p. 7

“Decisions should be based on facts, objectively considered — what I call the fact-founded, thought-through approach to decision making.”

Marvin Bower

Source: The Will to Manage (1966), p. 24

“People should be judged on the basis of their performance, not nationality, personality, education, or personal traits and skills.”

Marvin Bower

Source: The Will to Manage (1966), p. 24 cited in: Rodney B. Plimpton (1976) Top management leadership and organizational performance. p. 52

“… for all the reasons we have discussed in these pages, judgments brought to the board by leaders are likely to be better than those coming to the board in a command company. Moreover, the effective working relationships between leaders and directors in a leadership company further ensures the exercise of sound judgments for such momentous decisions …”

Marvin Bower

Source: The Will to Manage (1966), p. 134

Marvin Bower Quotes about business

“Fourteen basic and well-known managing processes make up the components from which a management system for any business can be fashioned.”

Marvin Bower

Source: The Will to Manage (1966), p. 26

“A business of high principle generates greater drive and effectiveness because people know that they can do the right thing decisively and with confidence.”

Marvin Bower

Source: The Will to Manage (1966), p. 25

“In large-scale organizations, the factual approach must be constantly nurtured by high-level executives. The more layers of authority through which facts must pass before they reach the decision maker, the greater the danger that they will be suppressed, modified, or softened, so as not to displease the "brass". For this reason, high-level executives must keep reaching for facts or soon they won't know what is going on. Unless they make visible efforts to seek and act on facts, major problems will not be brought to their attention, the quality of their decisions will decline, and the business will gradually get out of touch with its environment.”

Marvin Bower

Source: The Will to Manage (1966), p. 31

“The performance of business leaders during the next decade will play a major role in determining not only business but political and social trends for a long time to come. Here are some of the principal reasons:
- Business leaders control the economic well-being of and stockholder.
- The course of business shapes public opinion.
- Business leaders shape public opinion.
So, in addition to his or her prime responsibility of managing his or her enterprise at a profit, the business leader of today is faced with new and larger responsibilities. And, at the same time, the job of managing his or her enterprise at a profit is increasing in complexity. Consequently, the imposition of additional responsibilities makes the nation’s task of developing an adequate number of properly equipped executive leaders a staggering one indeed.”

Marvin Bower

Marvin Bower (1949) The development of executive leadership. Harvard University. Graduate School of Business Administration. p. v

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