ual's 1040 and is taxed as ordinary income. Likewise, if the business suffers a loss, or a lawsuit, the sole proprietor is wiped out. So this form of business proves to be a bad strategic decision for growth. 5
The hallmark, however, of American strategic thinking style is to maximize organizational productivity and to optimize performance from employees. In order to maximize productivity, good strategic thinkers try to encourage employees to elevate organizational goals above their own self-interest, work as a team or unit, and to put in a good eight to nine hours of work a day to achieve targets. For those unable to achieve such organizational goals, management can be unforgiving and fire or lay off unproductive members of the company's workforce. Even at the highest levels of the corporate world, chief executives and their firms have taken spills, only to later become even more successful and powerful. Despite the widespread realization that strategic failure does exist in corporate America, the habits of a smug and comfortable management establishment --management by guesswork or management by inertia --- persist. 6
Such habits among American management elite will always exist; but it is hopeful that most chief executives can recognize that reactive planning or simply muddling through are not sufficient to meet the demands of the present or the future. In today's global marketplace, any American company that does not consider its own competitive strategy and the strategies of its competitors.
In this case, the paradox arises from our conventional sense of what it means to be "in control." By resolving the paradox, we gain a broader understanding of what that concept can mean and a sharper focus on the culture. In the same way, understanding the paradoxes that surface in management sharpens our focus on the elements that create a culture dedicated to quality. Most corporations in America subscribe to a corporate...