“Nobody ever measured management properly.” Henry Mintzberg
Henry Mintzberg has spent a lifetime taking management myths out of sight for the sake of insight. The McGill professor and Thinkers50 Lifetime Achievement Award recipient joins Aidan McCullen to discuss his new book, Bust Those Management Myths, and explains why the effective strategies are learned as much as they are planned.
In this conversation, Henry Mintzberg reveals:
• Why the flat earth theory works perfectly well for building runways in Holland
• How the Egg McMuffin splits a class of managers down the middle on what strategy is
• The bees and flies in a bottle, and why too many bees are making strategy
• What Wayne Gretzky meant when he said he skates to where the puck is going to be
• Why top and middle management are dangerous metaphors
• Chains, hubs, webs and sets, explained through a wedding
• Why MBA programmes graduate technocrats who measure like mad
• The single disconnect behind eight of the book’s myths
Chapters
00:00 Strategy Position vs Perspective
01:49 Meet Henry Mintzberg
03:33 Myth Our Theory Is True
05:37 Updating Theories Over Time
07:20 Measurement Madness Myth
09:16 Strategy as Position and Perspective
11:15 Myth Strategies Are Planned
15:34 Intuition Experience and Bees
20:29 Myth Beyond Hierarchy
23:10 Chains Hubs Webs Sets
27:49 Management Art Craft Science
30:26 Targets Disconnect and Context
32:54 Left Brain Right Brain
Resources
Bust Those Management Myths (Berrett-Koehler): https://bkconnection.com/products/9798890571724_bust-those-management-myths
MythSite, the book’s companion site: https://mythsite.org
Planning on the Left Side and Managing on the Right (HBR, 1976): https://hbr.org/1976/07/planning-on-the-left-side-and-managing-on-the-right
Rebalancing Society: https://rebalancingsociety.org
Henry’s website and blog: https://mintzberg.org
About Henry Mintzberg
Henry Mintzberg holds the Cleghorn Chair of Management Studies at McGill University in Montreal and is a recipient of the Thinkers50 Lifetime Achievement Award. Bust Those Management Myths is his twenty-second book. Others include The Rise and Fall of Strategic Planning, Managers Not MBAs, Simply Managing and Rebalancing Society.
About the Host
Aidan McCullen is the 2025 Thinkers50 Innovation Award recipient, keynote speaker on AI, disruption, innovation and change, host of The Innovation Show, and author of Undisruptable: A Mindset of Permanent Reinvention (Wiley). Learn more at https://theinnovationshow.io/about-aidan-mccullen
About The Innovation Show
The Thinkers50-recognised podcast where square pegs find their place in a world of round holes. This series is brought to you by Kyndryl, who run and reimagine the technology systems that drive advantage for the world’s leading businesses. Learn more at https://www.kyndryl.com
Subscribe to the Thursday Thought: https://thethursdaythought.substack.com
Website: https://theinnovationshow.io
Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/ie/podcast/the-innovation-show/id1148455669
Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/63nFKf4bsSWo3W72gWtOsK?si=b62d9614237c4450
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/theinnovationshow
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/aidanmccullen
