{"title":"Management’s First Responsibility","authors":"Tobias Bruegger","doi":"10.5771/0935-9915-2023-2-146","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"What is the job of corporate managers? Management research has offered various perspectives on managerial work and on what the priority of managers should be, related to different views of the corporation and its objective. In this paper, I adopt a historically contextualized view of the institution of the corporation and argue that the first responsibility of corporate managers is to search for God. I draw upon the work of Michael Thomas Black to develop two strands to this argument: first, the priority of searching for God corresponds to the way corporations operate. Second, managers’ not searching for God results in their being directed by some form of ambition, which leads to corporate corruption. In corporate management, searching for God involves accounting for how the interests of the corporation as a distinct entity are embodied in what managers do. The paper offers a synthesis of Michael Black’s work that focuses on the first responsibility of corporate managers. It contributes to four issues of a managerial theory of the firm related to managerial orientation: the inescapable conundrums of managing, the role of stock- and stakeholders, ownership, and value creation. It draws implications for accounting and corporate regulation.","PeriodicalId":47269,"journal":{"name":"Management Revue","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":7.6000,"publicationDate":"2023-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Management Revue","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.5771/0935-9915-2023-2-146","RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":null,"ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"0","JCRName":"MANAGEMENT","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
What is the job of corporate managers? Management research has offered various perspectives on managerial work and on what the priority of managers should be, related to different views of the corporation and its objective. In this paper, I adopt a historically contextualized view of the institution of the corporation and argue that the first responsibility of corporate managers is to search for God. I draw upon the work of Michael Thomas Black to develop two strands to this argument: first, the priority of searching for God corresponds to the way corporations operate. Second, managers’ not searching for God results in their being directed by some form of ambition, which leads to corporate corruption. In corporate management, searching for God involves accounting for how the interests of the corporation as a distinct entity are embodied in what managers do. The paper offers a synthesis of Michael Black’s work that focuses on the first responsibility of corporate managers. It contributes to four issues of a managerial theory of the firm related to managerial orientation: the inescapable conundrums of managing, the role of stock- and stakeholders, ownership, and value creation. It draws implications for accounting and corporate regulation.
公司经理的工作是什么?管理研究提供了关于管理工作和管理者优先事项的各种观点,这些观点与公司及其目标的不同观点有关。在本文中,我对公司制度采取了一种历史语境化的观点,并认为公司管理者的首要责任是寻找上帝。我借鉴迈克尔•托马斯•布莱克(Michael Thomas Black)的研究成果,对这一论点提出了两条思路:首先,寻找上帝的优先顺序与企业的运营方式相对应。其次,管理者不寻求上帝导致他们被某种形式的野心所引导,从而导致公司腐败。在公司管理中,寻找上帝涉及到公司作为一个独特实体的利益如何体现在管理者的行为中。这篇论文综合了迈克尔•布莱克(Michael Black)关注企业管理者第一责任的著作。它为与管理取向相关的企业管理理论的四个问题做出了贡献:管理中不可避免的难题、股票和利益相关者的角色、所有权和价值创造。它给会计和公司监管带来了启示。
期刊介绍:
Management Revue - Socio-Economic Studies is an interdisciplinary European journal that undergoes peer review. It publishes qualitative and quantitative work, along with purely theoretical papers, contributing to the study of management, organization, and industrial relations. The journal welcomes contributions from various disciplines, including business and public administration, organizational behavior, economics, sociology, and psychology. Regular features include reviews of books relevant to management and organization studies.
Special issues provide a unique perspective on specific research fields. Organized by selected guest editors, each special issue includes at least two overview articles from leaders in the field, along with at least three new empirical papers and up to ten book reviews related to the topic.
The journal aims to offer in-depth insights into selected research topics, presenting potentially controversial perspectives, new theoretical insights, valuable empirical analysis, and brief reviews of key publications. Its objective is to establish Management Revue - Socio-Economic Studies as a top-quality symposium journal for the international academic community.