Ordway Tead

Ordway Tead (10 September 1891 – November 1973)[1] was an American organizational theorist, adjunct professor of industrial relations at Columbia University, chair of the New York Board of Higher Education, and first president of the Society for Advancement of Management (SAM) in 1936–37.[2]

Personal

Tead was born in Somerville, Massachusetts the son of Edward Sampson (1852-1919) and Louise Moore Ordway (1858-1935) Tead.[3] In 1915 Tead married Clara Alberta Murphy (1891-1980), long term president of Briarcliff College and they had one daughter, Diana Tead Michaelis (1925 1981) who was an award-winning documentary filmmaker and public television producer.[4] Tead died in Westport, Connecticut in November 1973.[3]

Career

Tead attended Amherst College where he obtained his AB 1912. After his graduation he served as fellow of the Amherst College at Southend House, a settlement house in Boston, from 1912 to 1914. In 1915 he co-founded Valentine, Tead & Gregg, an industrial consultants' firm in Boston, Massachusetts.[5] In 1917 he accepted a position in the Bureau of Industrial Research in New York City. Following the U.S.A.'s entry into the First World War he ran the War Department's employment management course at Columbia University.

Tead continued to teach at Columbia University from 1920 to 1950 and was adjunct professor of industrial relations until 1956. From 1938 to 1953 he was chair of the New York Board of Higher Education, where in 1941 he was involved in sacking any faculty staff who belonged to a Communist, Fascist or Nazi organization.[6]

In the year 1936-37 Tead served as first president of the Society for Advancement of Management (SAM) in 1936-37, where he was succeeded by William H. Gesell.[2]

From 1920 until his retirement in 1961 he worked in the publishing industry at both McGraw Hill and Harper & Row as an editor of business, social science and economics books.[3]

Contributions (partial)

Tead wrote some 21 books himself and authored numerous articles for professional publications. His book, The Art of Administration (1951) has been called his "magnum opus" where he contributed important insights on management and social philosophy.[7] Much ahead of his time, Tead was an early advocate of participative management and employee empowerment and argued for seeing employees as organizational stakeholders.[8] He was also an early proponent of corporate social responsibility arguing for the alignment of corporate aims with those of society and managers as agents of social change.[7]

Publications

Books, a selection

Articles, a selection

References
  1. MLW, "Tead, Ordway (1891–1973)," in: Encyclopedia of History of American Management, Morgen Witzel (ed.), 2005. p. 975
  2. S.A.M. Advanced Management Journal, Volume 53, 1988. p. 40
  3. Witzel, Morgen (2001). The biographical dictionary of management. Bristol: Thoemmes press. pp. 975–976. ISBN 978-1-85506-871-1.
  4. Times, Special to the New York (1981-12-18). "Diana T. Michaelis, Producer Of Movies and TV Programs". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2023-09-19.
  5. Proceedings of the Employment Managers' Conference, Philadelphia, Pa., April 2 and 3, 1917. U.S. Government Printing Office, 1917. p. 67.
  6. "DR. ORDWAY TEAD EDUCATOR, 82, DIES". The New York Times. 17 November 1973. Retrieved 14 July 2017 – via NYTimes.com.
  7. Duncan, W. Jack (1989). Great ideas in management: lessons from the founders and foundations of managerial practice. Jossey-Bass management series. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. pp. 140–144. ISBN 978-1-55542-122-9.
  8. O’Connor, Ellen S. (2001). "Back on the Way to Empowerment: The Example of Ordway Tead and Industrial Democracy". The Journal of Applied Behavioral Science. 37 (1): 15–32. doi:10.1177/0021886301371002. ISSN 0021-8863.
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