韩国裸舞

They're big thinkers with some old-fashioned lessons in business.

Be responsible. Provide solid management. Act with integrity.

In a world complicated by financial collapse and an increasingly disenchanted public, Canadians Don Tapscott, Roger Martin and Henry Mintzberg spoke to the Star about their Big Ideas for 2012.

The three are among the latest Thinkers50 - the definitive list of business gurus from around the world, published every two years.

Their thoughts signalled the return of a back-to-basics business style while suggesting a long, winding road ahead...

Henry Mintzberg, Cleghorn Professor of Management Studies, at the Desautels Faculty of Management, 韩国裸舞. Research interests include how managers are trained and developed. Thinkers ranking: 30

Big idea: solid management.

Mintzberg doesn't care for predictions, nor does he mince words about so-called big ideas.

"It gets nowhere," he said.

But what the longtime critic of MBA programs does want people to know is that there is no silver bullet in business.

"The big idea would be to get back to plain old managing and people know what's going on in their business, instead of all this hype," he said. "What we really need (is a) more thoughtful understanding of what's going on. Another big idea could be to open our eyes to what's been happening in management in the last few years - it's become a disaster area."

Mintzberg argues the American financial collapse of 2008 was a "management crisis" - at both the industry and government levels.

"If you take all those companies that collapsed, they collapsed because their management was dreadful. How could the people in these banks and insurance companies bet their whole companies on mortgages that were absolute utter junk. The United States government was dreadfully mismanaged by George W. Bush," he said.

What management doesn't need, he assures, is another quick solution.

"Managing is not about big ideas - managing is about putting your nose to grindstone and knowing what's going on in your company and being on top of it," he said.

Read full article: , November 18, 2011