This paper examines the meaning of management, scientific knowledge, and the advancement of technology (in particularly in the field of computer technology) in the 21st century. It looks at what it means to be a good manager, what it means to appreciate scientific truth, and the value of computing technology and the Internet.
Management/Technology
Management, Science, and Technology
Who Is a Manager?
A manager is someone who knows how to take charge, organize, direct, and be accountable for individuals and groups of people operating under his guidance. Anyone who shows leadership skills can be a manager. A manager's goal is to work towards the common good. This means keeping persons on pace to meet their objectives, budgeting time wisely, and instilling in his inferiors a desire to care.
Managerial Ethics
Top management impacts ethics within an organization by setting the tone and the standard for ethical practice. Superiors shape inferiors, not the other way around. Therefore, if top management encourages unethical activity through its own unethical behavior, an organization will, ultimately, be comprised of several unethical attitudes. A great example of this is Enron Corp. Top management of Enron encouraged poor ethical practices by practicing in a disingenuous manner themselves. They hoodwinked investors and encouraged their day traders to hoodwink as well (McLean, Elkind, 2013).
As Chet Holmes (2007) notes in The Ultimate Sales Machine, management needs to bond not only with customers but also with employees -- and unethical managers do not bond: they cheat. To encourage a solid system of ethics in an organization, top management must embody that system within themselves.
Science and Technology
Just because the scientific test of a scientific theory is accepted by the community of men and women who are called scientists, does not actually mean that anything is acceptable as long as enough of the right people agree with it. A lot of intelligent people on Wall Street thought buying and selling sub-prime mortgages would be a good thing: turned out not to be. In other words, just because a lot of experts agree on something, doesn't mean what they agree upon is true.
Does that mean there is no such thing as scientific truth? Not at all. Aristotle tells us that truth is identity between our minds and reality. Scientific truth exists and it can be grasped when we use our intelligence. We aren't doomed to rely on the opinion of experts, many of whom may be swayed to say something by various factors -- such as the bestowal of grants, peer pressure, etc.
Does science differ from politics, art, or religion, in that case? Not really. A lot of scientific thought today is based on empirical study -- that is, the gathering of lots of information, which is then examined and used as the basis for the formulation of scientific theory. Empiricism also dominates today's political world. Numerous studies are always being performed, and intelligence communities are filled to the gills with data regarding various sorts of people, their practices and habits and so on. As for art and religion, the intellect still plays a predominant roll in how views and opinions are developed in these spheres. But the use of the intellect in arriving at artistic or religious truth is disappearing. A tendency to prefer to rely on numbers and data has begun to permeate even these fields, so much so that people seem to unanimously wonder where all the world's common sense has gone to.
Technological Revolutions
We are now living in a third great technological transformation called the Knowledge Revolution. Thanks to the Internet, the equivalent of the great Library of Alexandria, information is at our fingertips anywhere and everywhere we go. Thanks to smart phones, we can fit the great library in our pocket. The advancement of technology has allowed us to connect to individuals around the world in ways never before possible. Today's flow of information is virtually unequalled by any other era in the history of mankind. The Internet makes this flow possible. And with this flow comes an enormous wave of knowledge that can radically change the way we think, live, and act.
In this sense, computers truly have changed our lives so much that we can call this a revolution like the Industrial Revolution of the 18th century. More and more businesses are going online as commercial retailers find that the Internet is where tomorrow's real estate is. Consumers are buying more and more products through sites like Amazon, and more and more companies are relying on computers in order to conduct their day-to-day affairs.
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