I have just started a new half-semester class called Technology Strategy
recently. As I submitted my analyses of the first 2 cases that were due
yesterday, I pondered the following. Faculty members and students at
management school observe, analyze, and synthesize the processes and
strategies of successful or failed enterprises. Grand models were
formalized to explain how the processes were observed in the business
world while ground-breaking techniques were devised for achieving
corporate goals. But the real managers whom we are studying may not had
attended business school at all. Take for instance Bill Gates of
Microsoft, he seem to have a good grasp of business. His company,
Microsoft, seems to be ran in ways that support the precepts of
good strategy, as it is defined in our Strategy class. Yet Gates didn't even
complete college, let alone attended
business school. Was he a genius or are some of the class material just
plain or some derivative of common sense? In either case, I strongly
believe that while we can write grandiose analyses of our cases,
ultimately it is practice and our actual implementation that will get
the corporation to where it wants to go.