Job analysis in management training

In his article in the January issue (Vol 2 No 1) John Wellens offered for consideration the view that Job Analysis can be death to the concept of creating a situation in which the subordinate manager can optimise his contribution through the exercise of initiative and decision‐making, that it is restrictive and inward looking, and is not the core activity of management training. These are powerful criticisms that must not be allowed to pass without comment, especially when so many newly‐trained training officers will have accepted this concept on the courses they attended, and may therefore feel completely confused. My own personal philosophy and strategy of management training, education and development is based on the job analysis concept, which does, however, vary from that put forward by John Wellens.