The concept was presented in an article titled "Managing by Wire" in the September–October 1993 issue of Harvard Business Review by Stephan H. Haeckel and Richard L.
[1] The authors selected "Managing by Wire" as the title because readers would relate to the comforting, modern scene in the cockpit of an aviator carefully flying the jet to its destination.
[2] Aetna, an insurance company, made related changes in the hopes of enabling their account executives to field client inquiries about novel services and products.
Vacante noted that this will "reduce risk and uncertainty of delivery and support as the redundant iron mountains of equipment and supplies give way to precisely tailored packages distributed by a transportation network that can transverse the full spectrum of the battle space".
[6] According to Simon Head's 2003 book The New Ruthless Economy, the "Managing by Wire" article "clearly had a strong influence" on SAP SE, which created "its own real-life version of the 'management cockpit'" represented by a conference room.
This allows the CEO and upper-level management to review the key performance indicators for the entire company, after which they can look into more precise information from enterprise resource planning software such as how well their employees are doing their work.