The evolution of popular management ideas: an exploration and extension of the old wine in new bottles metaphor

This paper tells the stories of the emergence and evolution of four management ideas: organisational learning, the learning organisation, the learning company and knowledge management. It explores, evaluates and extends the 'old wine in new bottles' metaphor, and its relevance for the coining and naming of management fashions. The paper neither totally contradicts nor fully agrees with the wine–bottle metaphor. Labels of management ideas sometimes do not seem to be so new after all. Labels also seem to be more important than what the wine–bottle metaphor indicates; they might also affect the content. Consequently, it should rather be 'semi-old wine in old, recycled bottles'. The label seems to be less important for the more academic idea of organisational learning, in that it has experienced a split into two ideas that both go under the same label, and therefore should be understood as 'new wine in old bottles'.