Shu Ching
Mentoring, The TAO of Giving and Receiving Wisdom (1995)
Chugliang Al Huang and Jerry Lynch
Sustained success in the third millennium - to be On The Cutting-Edge Without Being Cut® requires an "updated" success development paradigm - we suggest:
Change from "integrating" to "unifying" Optimum Fitness in the third millennium extends beyond the domain of "physical fitness" to embrace all of the domains contingent upon survival, health and well-being. Fitness becomes a dynamic "state of readiness" that includes both personal and organizational perspectives. Notions of management and leadership play a mission essential role in the actualization of this "fitness=readiness" paradigm.
Suggestion: To be on the cutting-edge without being cut requires careful attention to all eight fitness domains not just one.
MASTERPRENEURSHIP® Executive Coaching and Mentoring offers one-on-one individual coaching and mentoring services to business, military, government, not for profit and sports, entertainment and most professional categories to supplement their custom training programs and additionally other organization effectiveness products and services including: Management development courses, trainers, speakers, leadership courses, as well as consultants, middle management courses seminars, workshops, government Leadership Seminars courses, death and dying seminars, grief counseling courses, custom training courses, trainers, speakers, training products & supplies, Leadership Seminars, management training, time management training, Internet, training, optimum performance training, military leadership, military management development, organizational effectiveness training, customer service training, strategic management courses, human development courses, optimum performance courses, business management courses, courses, presentations, personal fitness training, supervision courses, team building courses, coaching courses, stress management courses, time management courses, healthcare management training, human resource courses, books, marketing courses, career development, organizational development, performance management training, videos, quality performance training, outcome assessment training, adult education, personal development, keynote speakers, CD-ROM, and personal organizers, business supplies and equipment and software.
We propose three initial questions in the development of any custom coaching program: first, management and leadership of what, second, who determines the meaning of "effective," and finally, how are the desired management and leadership practices developed? Whatever the content of the training, we believe that it must be sound, scholarly and responsibly developed.
Responsible knowledge generation aims at answering questions about the nature of human beings and human systems (Bentz and Shapiro 1998), questions not only concerning pragmatic issues such as "best practices" but also fundamental philosophical questions concerning, for example, issues of axiology, epistemology, ontology and teleology (Polkinghorne 1983; Slife 1995; Tashakkori and Teddlie 1998). Knowledge for "effective" practice presupposes serious attention to both the different journeys that scholars take and the philosophical justifications of different modes of conducting inquiry. Sound practice, therefore, follows sound inquiry based upon sound assumptions.
What is the nature of business and management coaching outcome research? Have the ground rules of business changed with the advent of electronic commerce, including global and wireless computing? Is the main concern from a business perspective that "there is no central control of the medium?" Thus, speed, collaboration, and agility are the hallmarks of the business environment as we enter the new millennium. Opportunities abound by companies of all sizes and locations being able to market directly to consumers virtually worldwide. With the business "playing field" changing, what does this mean from a research perspective? A central question concerns me about "sound inquiry" and conducting research in the field of business and management especially from an perspective: Is business management and leadership research different from research in other areas of inquiry? A tentative answer to this question appears to have three parts. The first part concerns the context of business, which (Remenyi 1998) suggests involves four important issues: 1. Business stakeholders having a direct interest in business management and leadership research appear different from those in areas such as anthropology, education, sociology, psychology and other social sciences. The range of stakeholders includes management, unions, employees, shareholders, management consultants, and academics including students, supervisors, examiners and professors. Each stakeholder has a different agenda and will potentially influence not only what is researched, but also how the research is conducted, funded and eventually used. 2. Business strongly emphasizes the application of knowledge rather than the creation of knowledge for its own sake no matter what stakeholder group is studied. The issue is that such studies do not usually lend themselves to inquiry in basic research. It appears that the most valued business and management research leads to knowledge which will allow management to change the way things get done in order to be more efficient and/or more effective. An example of the nature of business and management research is the contrasting management research into teams conducted by (Belbin 1981) and the sociological research on teams by (Gersick 1992). These two studies of working teams have very different goals, approaches and outcomes. Belbin's goal, for example, was to understand better the team process in order to enable managers to operate more effectively when disparate groups of people must work together. In contrast, Gersick's research was not focused on solving an immediate management problem; her goal was to document what was being observed and then to theorize in a general way about the underlying process. Effective business and management studies seek to find solutions to practical problems; however, this does not in anyway make this type of research any less rigorous. If anything, competent business and management research is extremely demanding because of the large number of complex interrelated issues and variables, which are inevitably involved in the context of real life business situations. 3. The third issue concerns the very broad nature of the field study. Studies ranging from inquiries into stock markets to debates on to how to effectively display merchandise on the shelves of supermarkets. Topics, to name a few, might include how to increase employee and customer satisfaction or how to limit political power struggles among a board of directors. The wide range of possible research topics suggests a multiplicity of research tactics and tools. 4. The fourth important issue concerns the context in which the research takes place. The fast pace of change in both the theory and practice of management presents a very challenging context in which to conduct research. For example, in strategic management, a move away from the "design school approach" to the "resource-based view" of the firm took place in just a few years. The changes in thinking which included total quality management (TQM) and then business process re-engineering (BPR) all occurred, in what for other social sciences would be considered a very short period. Although these ideas do not always represent fundamental revolutions in thought, the changes in thinking clearly have a significant impact on organizations, as well as research agendas.
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