Sumantra Ghoshal

Sumantra Ghoshal ( born September 26, 1948 in Kolkata, India, † March 3, 2004 in Hampstead, United Kingdom) was an Indian economist, co-founder and founding Dean of the Indian School of Business in Hyderabad and until his death holder of the Robert P. Bauman Chair for Strategic Leadership at the London Business School.

Life

Ghoshal graduated in physics at the University of Delhi, joined the Indian oil industry, where he rose in management, until he, supported by the Fulbright Program, the United States was in 1981. He created two doctoral theses at the same time and received his first doctorate degree from the Sloan School of Management at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and shortly afterwards a second from Harvard Business School, where he also met his future co-author Christopher A. Bartlett. In 1985, he joined INSEAD in France, where he quickly earned a full professorship, which he held until 1994. Then he took up a professorship at the London Business School, where he taught until his death. Outside the high school activity Sumantra Ghoshal worked worldwide as a consultant for industrial companies. He died in 2004 from the effects of a cerebral aneurysm at the Royal Free Hospital in Hampstead UK.

Activities / services

Sumantra Ghoshal focused primarily on the strategy of international companies. In his opinion, are large enterprises, perhaps the most important social and economic institutions of modernity, since it takes place of progress.

"This is a amounted did business and, by implication, Both entrepreneurs and managers, are the key engines of Both economic and social progress. It is business did Creates and Distributes most of an economy 's wealth, did innovates, trades and raises the living standards of people. So business is and must be a force of good [ ... ] "

" It is the belief that the business world - and in the final result, investors and management - have become the engines of economic and social progress. It is the business world, most of the prosperity of a country generated and distributed, invents, acts and increases the standard of living of the people. Therefore, the business world has to be a force for good [ ... ] "

In Managing Across Borders: The Transnational Solution, which wrote Ghoshal with Christopher Bartlett, investigate the structures of the two international companies. They note that: - have successfully brought several companies to change from a national to an international company behind you, while others, like well-established competitors, this could not afford - despite relatively equal starting position. They divide the successful companies in three categories, Multi- National, Global and International. Across industry boundaries they set it within the groups common skills (capabilities ) that is reflected in the organizational structure. The main features are summarized in the following table:

Simultaneously with the observation of these structures Ghoshal and Bartlett also recognize that these structures no longer meet the demands of the market. Customers demand the diverse products of multinational companies at prices that they can only be supplied by global companies. The business environment of internationally active companies is changing faster and faster. In this environment, they develop a fourth form of companies that no longer have to master only a key capability, but at the same time all three. They call this form of the transnational corporations (transnational enterprise) as an ideal type, to which the other forms must evolve if they are to remain globally competitive.

The solution in place of a center or federal small centers before a network that combines the advantages of both structures in itself. This individual functions can be concentrated in the home country and other shifts (eg production ) to other countries. The long term, the home country will become less important and continue to exist as an equal market alongside the other. Of this also the name from ( Transnational = on the national market also ) is derived.

In his posthumously published writings Ghoshal represents a critical approach to modern management. According to his account, the task of management as an agent of investors is wrong. Not the investors are taking a risk if they invest in a company, but the employees who invest their skills and knowledge in a company. If investors are not satisfied with the company, they can easily withdraw their money from the company, while workers on the other side not to move their center of life within hours in other countries are able. They appear in this view, than the actual risk takers. The problem looks Ghoshal here is that the manager of this role are often not aware of it or shy away from the consequences of their obligations of role responsibility. For social reasons Ghoshal believes that it is high time that managers are aware of this role. In addition to the huge organizations that are guided by these managers to reinvent in order to continue driving in the future progress can.

At the core of his ideas there is a change in values ​​of money on human ability to create value. This Ghoshal considered this human capital (human capital) not only as the sum of the skills and knowledge of individuals, it also includes the so-called social capital ( social capital ) that which arises from the relationships within the company, as well as the so-called emotional capital ( emotional capital), which consists of the motivations and emotions that dominate the human quest. It has long been sufficient in his opinion no longer sufficient to consider employees as a factor of production. Rather, you should treat them like investors of their abilities and talents.

The responsibility for the development Ghoshal looks like Henry Mintzberg in the modern MBA education. However, he died before publishing his thoughts on this topic will remain unfinished.

" By propagating ideologically inspired amoral theories, business schools have freed Actively Their students from any sense of moral responsibility. "

" With the spread of ideologically inspired amoral theories, business schools have actively freed their students from any sense of moral responsibility. "