Even while writing with a good degree of balance, Art Kleiner gives the clear impression of being friendly to the ideas of highly controversial organizational theorist Elliott Jaques. Jaques is far from alone in his view that today’s management is highly unscientific, being full of concepts that don’t support a testable theory. He departs from other methodological critics by claiming to have the answer. No love is lost on either side between Jaques and most organizational development theorists. This may partly derive from the sheer hubristic certainty of Jaques’ belief that he has the universal model for perfect and scientific organizational design.

Jaques find hierarchies to be the key to successful organization. In its pure form – the “requisite organization” – management hierarchy enables effective solutions of problems of corporate performance, boss-subordinate relationships, partner relationships, organizational role design and compensation system design – and just about everything else. In a schema that sounds disturbingly reminiscent of Huxley’s Brave New World, he outlines nine strata of organization. Making sure that everyone fits properly in these strata is the path to perfect management. A person’s suitability to any strata is determined by their ability to deal with cognitive complexity and is measured by the time horizon of their roles’ tasks.

According to Kleiner, this focus on strata and degrees of capability avoids becoming highly abusive thanks to Jaques second insight: a shift in managerial accountability. This means that every boss is accountable not only for overseeing subordinates but also for their results. Managers therefore need to understand the time horizons of their subordinates and have sufficient authority to decide exactly works for you and to be able to choose what kinds of coaching are needed (rather than leaving this to the training department). Kleiner’s account of these ideas is guaranteed to stimulate, whether you fall into line and agree with all of Jaques’ framework or find it deeply dangerous and narrowing in perspective.