Alfred Chandler, the man who almost singlehandedly invented the field of study in Business Management, has passed away.
In the past few months, we have seen the deaths of many a great contributor to our thinking and society (namely, Milton Friedman) – Alfred Chandler was one of these “gurus”.
While this site articulates some of his achievements, I can’t help but be reminded of the time when I referred Chandler’s work to a mate of mine at uni.
This friend of mine and I were discussing the issues around cost management, and the obsession at the time in spending millions upon millions of dollars on e-procurement and other online facilities in an effort to save a couple of hundreds bucks on a tonne of paperclips (it was the late 90s). We both thought it was a waste of time and resources. I recalled that Chandler had raised the very issue in his marvellous book, “The Visible Hand” – he also felt it was a false economy, so I endeavoured to grab the book and show my friend the next week.
So the following week, as a total fluke, we were there in a lecture, when the lecturer started talking about some of the works of “Herbert Chandler”. I turned to my friend, who was sitting behind me in the lecture, and pulled out the book, pointing to his name on the top, “A-L-F-R-E-D CHANDLER”. My mate pissed himself laughing, and we both shook our heads at the dreadful “Lecture by PowerPoint” that was unfolding in front of us.
So upon hearing of his death, my friend emailed me this week:
I hear Albert Chandler is dead.
Vale Edwin Chandler……. First Hilton Freeman, now Alwyn Chandler.
Writer of literary and reference milestones such as “The Visible Gland”, and “Scaley Pokes”
God rest his hole.