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Around last year-end, there were massive complaints about the TTC’s ham-handed management of its regular annual fare increase. Here’s another, more local, complaint. The TTC has shut down the York Mills commuter parking lot that I, and hundreds of other riders, use. All the TTC website says it that it will be closed from May 29 to September 6. When you pass by the parking lot, it appears that it is being used for bus driver training, because the TTC has put up pilons and a simulated bus stop, and you see buses driving in circles.

This is a lot that is almost always full, even in summer, by 9 am. So the drivers have to go somewhere else, and this creates inconvenience, and likely encourages some of them to drive downtown. Yesterday I parked on the street near the Lawrence subway station, the closest to York Mills, and received a $15 ticket for exceeding the 3 hour on-street parking limit.

In past years, the TTC shut down the York Mills parking lot for bus training in August. I assume that because they didn’t have more protests they shut it down longer this year. And of course this was done in typical TTC fashion, with no explanation. But couldn’t the TTC have found some alternative space for the activity that wouldn’t have disrupted hundreds of commuters for an entire summer?

This is typical of the TTC’s arrogant and unimaginative approach to service. It can establish a forum on public service, but whatever is said at the forum doesn’t seem to affect day-to-day operations.

I’ve sent a complaint through the website, but don’t expect a quick reaction.

Enlightened organizations have bots that scan the Internet for any comments about them in the blogosphere, and get back to the blogger. I’ve had such responses on several occasions, but again don’t expect this from the TTC.

Speaking of disruptions, I posted in mid-May about how disruptive and expensive the G20 summit would be, and, as more and more organizations are shutting their doors for that weekend, it’s clear I was right on the money about that one.

The only thing to do is escape, so I won’t be posting next week. I’ll be back after the summit, and hopefully in a better mood.

It is paradoxical that while so many books about management are being published, so few of them are by management professors. There are three mutually reinforcing reasons for this.

First, many fields within management have adopted a natural sciences research model that emphasizes publishing academic journal articles rather than books.

Second, the research component of the influential Financial Times global ranking of business schools is based on articles published in a list of 40 top-tier academic journals. Administrators attempting to improve a school’s rankings will therefore, as they say, incent faculty members to publish articles in those academic journals rather than books.

Third, business schools have been growing, which means hiring entry level faculty members. To get tenure, assistant professors need to publish quickly, and books take too long, so a business school with a young faculty – as most are – will concentrate on publishing academic journal articles.

Despite these reasons, there are a few management professors who continue to write books. I’ll suggest two important reasons why.

First, there are still some management professors, especially tenured full professors, who undertake big and ambitious research projects, and a book is the vehicle par excellance for publishing the results. A book is the place to publish a new theory, work out is implications and applications, and analyze the supporting evidence. A book is the place to synthesize a field or subfield. A book is the place to create a new field or subfield.

Here are a few examples at the Rotman School. Richard Florida wrote a book to explain and elaborate on his theory of the creative class. Andy Stark in a recent book addressed the complicated question of the shifting margin between public and private sector responsibilities in the US. In my own case, I found that a book was the best format for a comprehensive look at innovation in government, both in general and in a variety of different policy areas.

Books have the related advantage that they consolidate research in one place, rather than spread it around a number of different academic journals. A book is the place to go for the first word, last word, and the whole story in between.

The second reason for publishing a book is to reach a different and possibly larger audience. Journal articles are necessarily aimed exclusively at academic colleagues, who are the only people who read the journals. A book might also be read beyond one’s academic colleagues, possibly by practitioners and even the general public. Many academics aspire to write something that reaches out beyond his or her academic colleagues to a broader public, and a book is still the vehicle for doing that.

A three-part injunction for living a full life, attributed to the nineteenth century Cuban independence leader and writer Jose Marti, is to plant a tree, have a child, and write a book. I hope that more management professors, particularly those with the security of tenure, will embrace the third part.

Last week’s post discussed two anthems traditionally performed at the Last Night of the Proms, Land of Hope and Glory and Jerusalem. There is a third, “Rule, Britannia!” which celebrates the Royal Navy. And the idea of celebrating the Royal Navy takes me by the following logic to today’s blog, the last in the series dealing with the exam in my graduate narratives course.

The Royal Navy is an institution with a long and proud history. The narratologist would ask if its history is anywhere to be found on its rubric in cyberspace, www.royalnavy.mod.uk. It turns out that the Royal Navy’s banner headlines are “modern and relevant” and “capable and resilient” and it prominently displays a new blog. There is, however, a link to its history on a banner at the top of the site, and the history is organized by periods, ships, leaders, and battles.

Looking a bit farther afield, both the Number 10 Downing St. (www.number10,gov.uk) and White House (www.whitehouse.gov) websites have links to a history of the place and its occupants.

In one of the exam questions, I asked students to provide a rationale and organizational role for a Chief Narrative Officer, using as an example any organization of their choosing. One of the roles of the CNO would be stewardship of the organization’s official history, as described above.

A broader position description would be to model, encourage, and champion the effective use of narrative throughout the organization. Some of the ways narrative could be used would include narratives about the organization’s clients or customers and how they benefit from the organization’s products or services, narratives about the organization’s employees and how they do valuable and meaningful work, and narratives about the organization itself, including its history and achievements.

The CNO should encourage the use of narratives on the website, in speeches, annual reports, and advertising. She should also advise people about how to develop convincing and persuasive narratives.

The most important thing to realize about the role of CNO is that it is a classic staff role, intended to support both the organization’s executive leaders and its line managers. The key questions about staff roles are where they fit in organization’s structure and whom they report to. The CNO’s natural allies would be in corporate communications, high-level (as opposed to brand) marketing, and strategic planning.

One thing few of the MBA students who took the exam mentioned was that people in staff roles, particularly if the role is new, need a high level patron. So a particularly important question is whom the CNO would report to, and the answer would be someone at the senior level with clout over the long run.

Recruiting a CNO might be a challenge. There aren’t any obvious producers of CNO’s as there are obvious producers of accountants or marketers. So I would suggest advertising the position and recruiting widely and seeing who applies. This would also imply recruiting beyond business schools and thus looking to cultural institutions, places as outside-the-box as graduate programs in literature or cultural studies. Who knows, perhaps in the future one of the graduates on the course will actually describe her position as CNO.