Henri Fayol, (1908). "L’exposee des principles generaux d’administration". Unpublished paper, translated by J.D Breeze. published in: Daniel A. Wren, Arthur G. Bedeian, John D. Breeze, (2002) "The foundations of Henri Fayol’s administrative theory", Management Decision, Vol. 40 Iss: 9, pp.906 - 918 ; p. 911
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According to the dictionary, to administer is to govern, or to manage a public or private business. It means, therefore, to seek to make the best possible use of the resources available in achieving the goal of the enterprise. Administration includes, therefore, all the operations of the enterprise. But as a result of the usual way of organizing things to facilitate the running of the business, a certain number of activities constitute the special departments; the technical department, the commercial department, the financial department, etc., and the scope of the administrative department is found to be reduced accordingly.

— Henri Fayol on Principles of administration

What It Means

This is a placeholder explanation generated by the low-overhead model. It interprets "According to the dictionary, to administer is to govern, or to manage a public or private business. It means, therefore, to seek to make the best possible use of the resources available in achieving the goal of the enterprise. Administration includes, therefore, all the operations of the enterprise. But as a result of the usual way of organizing things to facilitate the running of the business, a certain number of activities constitute the special departments; the technical department, the commercial department, the financial department, etc., and the scope of the administrative department is found to be reduced accordingly." in the context of "Henri Fayol, (1908). "L’exposee des principles generaux d’administration". Unpublished paper, translated by J.D Breeze. published in: Daniel A. Wren, Arthur G. Bedeian, John D. Breeze, (2002) "The foundations of Henri Fayol’s administrative theory", Management Decision, Vol. 40 Iss: 9, pp.906 - 918 ; p. 911" to mean that wisdom is timeless.

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Source: Wikiquote: "Principles of administration" (Quotes: Quotes are arranged alphabetically by author, A - F) The 'What it means' explanation text was generated by Google Gemini Flash (accessed January 18, 2026). https://gemini.google.com/app
Henri Fayol

About Henri Fayol

Henri Fayol (29 July 1841, Istanbul – 19 November 1925, Paris) was a French mining engineer and director of mines who developed a general theory of business administration.