India: Best and worst management in the world?

A joint report from strategic consultants McKinsey and Co. and the London School of Economics reveals that management practices in multinational companies in India are second only to management in the United States, but management of local Indian companies is at the bottom of the barrel. The authors were puzzled by the findings, but attribute one result--75 percent of U.S. companies are managed more poorly than the top 10 percent of Indian companies--to the theory that as one of the world's fastest-developing economies, India is open to foreign ownership and thus, has a lot to learn from the practices and processes of multinational companies. The study notes that multinational companies are more successful than government-run organizations and family firms. They're also more successful than local companies, which have a home-turf advantage, the article in CIO Insight points out. What's enabling the increased performance of companies? A manager's good practices. The study noticed that good management is helped by flexible labor markets, competition within a given market and educated employees (84 percent of managers tend to be better educated than their employees by a degree level or higher). The project took five years to complete and looked at more than 4,000 medium-sized manufacturers in the United States, Europe and Asia.

For more on the study:
- read all about the results in this CIO Insight Article