Gordon Wills

Special Issue: Business School Graffiti

BUSINESS SCHOOL GRAFFITI is a highly personal and revealing account of the first ten years (1965–1975) at Britain’s University Business Schools. The progress achieved is documented in a whimsical fashion that makes it highly readable. Gordon Wills has been on the inside throughout the decade and has played a leading role in two of the major Schools. Rather than presuming to present anything as pompous as a complete history of what has happened, he recalls his reactions to problems, issues and events as they confronted him and his colleagues. Lord Franks lit a fuse which set a score of Universities and even more Polytechnics alight. There was to be a bold attempt to produce the management talent that the pundits of the mid‐sixties so clearly felt was needed. Buildings, books, teachers who could teach it all, and students to listen and learn were all required for the boom to happen. The decade saw great progress, but also a rapid decline in the relevancy ethic. It saw a rapid withering of interest by many businessmen more accustomed to and certainly desirous of quick results. University Vice Chancellors, theologians and engineers all had to learn to live with the new and often wealthier if less scholarly faculty members who arrived on campus. The Research Councils had to decide how much cake to allow the Business Schools to eat. Most importantly, the author describes the process of search he went through as an individual in evolving a definition of his own subject and how it can best be forwarded in a University environment. It was a process that carried him from Technical College student in Slough to a position as one of the authorities on his subject today.

Networking and Its Leadership Processes

Aims to review what has been learned and published recently about networking, using examples from the experiences of the International Management Centre (IMC). Describes the IMC network and leadership process (including the use of the two‐level Bulletin Board System and the Atherton Intelligence System) before discussing why networks are necessary and detailing how they function. Covers areas such as finance, network evolution, and the major causes of failure. Concludes that networks are an important tool for the future in view of their ability to change to meet market needs.

Marketing of Continuing Management Development

Describes how one university school applied the principles and practices of marketing to short course activities between 1975 and 1979. Reveals that the application afforded good commercial success.

Customer Policy as an Alternative Orientation to Marketing Simple

This monograph argues that boardroom marketing must be integrated with purchasing and distribution activities in a synthesised role focused on customer policy. The author sees this as the next step forward and argues that such a new alignment in company thinking would enable it to take account of the host of societal pressures it encounters, as well as improving management approaches toward channel members. Issues of independence/interdependence, professionalism, educational imperatives, and materialism are all examined and a customer policy audit proposed with suitable guidelines. It is a radical and provocative think‐piece worthy of widespread attention amongst senior marketeers, purchasing and distribution executives.