A management revolution is needed.

In business, management is everything. Good management can turn even a lemon of a company into a star; poor management can wreck the soundest of firms. Top managers are the highest paid professionals in the world with salary figures often in the millions of dollars bracket.

Perhaps the most dramatic manifestation of the management phenomenon is to be found in the upper echelons of professional football in Europe. Clubs like Manchester United, Real Madrid, Arsenal and Chelsea not only win very lucrative championships, they have become vastly successful businesses. While their business achievements cannot entirely be attributed to the football manager, he is nevertheless the focal point of their 'core' business, i.e. football.

Managers like Manchester United's Alex Ferguson and Arsenal's Arsene Wenger are worth their weight in gold because through their successes on the football pitch, their clubs have become worth billions of pounds sterling.

The same dramatic impact can be observed in the reverse direction. When a highly successful manager leaves a club, or is 'persuaded' to leave, it can fall from the skies in a shockingly short period of time.

Such was the fate of England's Leeds United when its manager, David O'Leary left. Within a season, Leeds United went from being one of the strongest and wealthiest clubs in the English Premiership League to demotion out of the premiership and virtual bankruptcy.

This is the impact of management. It explains the high salaries offered to the top people and also why companies (and clubs) will do anything to secure the services of 'miracle working' bosses.

THE OTHER SIDE OF THE COIN

That is one side of the coin. The other is replete with instances of poor, even downright useless managers. A mushrooming number of business schools and courses are churning out thousands of new managers by the day but only a handful of them will ever rise to any great heights.

Why? Studies have shown that the main reason for failure is because these managers receive standardised training--the same solutions for the same problems. Life, and business, is not like that.

Some problems are standard but most are not. Good managers are those who can think 'out of the box' and find original solutions to novel problems.

This is of particular importance when it comes to Africa. If Africa is to get anywhere near to achieving any Millennium Development Goals, it needs excellent management at all levels--national as well as commercial. At the moment, one has to sadly admit that Africa is full of failed enterprises. This is a clear indication of failed, or inappropriate management.

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That said, it must also be pointed out that there are shining examples of countries that have become very successful enterprises--Botswana and Tunisia immediately spring to mind.

What is the chief difference between the management approaches in these two examples and the rest of the continent? Studies reveal a simple fact: Where culture is interwoven into the fabric of management philosophy, the result tends to be successful; where local culture is absent and the management technique is alien to the environment, either wholesale failure or underperformance is the result.

IMPORTANCE OF LOCAL KNOWLEDGE

When you think about it, this revelation is only common sense. After all, all management is about organising people to work towards meeting their own needs and desires. People will work best when they are most comfortable and therefore most confident--that is again common sense. All people--be they Japanese, Italian, Nigerian, Swazi--are most comfortable in their own cultural environments. That is why management techniques vary from country to country and historic period to historic period.

Everywhere except in Africa. Africa is lumbered with alien management techniques conceived in an era that has long been discarded into the rubbish bin of history.

For Africa to advance, it must follow the example of Japan and South-East Asia. It must evolve its own management philosophy--one rooted in African culture.

One of the world's biggest banks, HSBC, has discovered that 'culture-sensitive' management can yield vast profits. It has made this the cornerstone of its operations.

Multinational companies are increasingly following the trend. They are far less keen to employ expatriate staff and are now ranging far and wide, even in the diaspora, to attract personnel who are 'culturally compatible'. Advertising agencies, based in the West, have discovered that simply transferring Eurocentric campaigns to Africa does not produce results--in fact can be negative. The more globalised the world becomes, the more significant 'local knowledge' becomes. This is where the competitive edge now resides.

A management revolution is waiting to happen in Africa. The question is who will respond to the challenge?