John Theurer Diebold (June 8, 1926 – December 26, 2005). An American businessman who was a pioneer in the field of automation, founding The Diebold Group to advise corporations around the world as well as governments in the U.S and abroad in the potential of information technology.

Early life

Diebold was born in

Weehawken, New Jersey Weehawken is a township in the northern part of Hudson County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. It is located largely on the Hudson Palisades overlooking the Hudson River. As of the 2020 United States census, the population was 17,197.

. After graduating from

Weehawken High School Weehawken High School is a six-year comprehensive public high school that serves students in seventh through twelfth grade from Weehawken in Hudson County, New Jersey, United States, operating as part of the Weehawken School District. The sch ...

, he enrolled at Swarthmore College, then during the war attended the

United States Merchant Marine Academy The United States Merchant Marine Academy (USMMA or Kings Point) is a United States service academy in Kings Point, New York. It trains its midshipmen (as students at the academy are called) to serve as officers in the United States Merchant ...

and served in the merchant marine, returning to Swarthmore in 1946 to earn a B.S. in Engineering. He then completed an MBA at the Harvard Business School in 1951. At the Harvard Business School he worked with venture-capital pioneer

Georges Doriot Georges Frédéric Doriot (September 24, 1899 – June 1987) was a French-American known for his prolific careers in military, academics, business and education. An émigré from France, Doriot became a professor of Industrial Management at Har ...

and his colleague Curtis Tarr, who advised Diebold's research project on "Making the Automatic Factory a Reality". Diebold made automation studies the focus of his assignments for a small Chicago-based consulting firm, then in 1954 he returned to Weehawken to found his own consulting company. By 1960, he numbered more than 30 prominent clients including such notable companies as Bear, Sterns & Company; Boeing Airplane; General Electric, Radio Corporation of America; Westinghouse Electric; and others. Diebold's first book, '' Automation: The Advent of the Automatic Factory'', based on his studies at the Harvard Business School, was published by Van Nostrand in 1952. Owing to independent research and ever-persistent curiosity about the whole field of technology, he originated many of the concepts of data processing and utilization that are accepted today in both automation and management. This book was reissued unchanged on its 30th anniversary as a “management classic” by the American Management Association. He is credited with coining the word automation in its present meaning, and had much to do with introducing it to general usage.

Career summary

1952 wrote first book, Automation, originating many concepts basic in today's technology. 1954 founded John Diebold & Associates, consulting in automation and management; later known as The Diebold Group, the international management consulting firm. It was sold to Daimler-Benz in 1991. 1968 founded The Diebold Institute for Public Policy Studies, an operating foundation to apply advanced computer and communications technology to the improvement of the quality of life for a broad segment of the public. In 2005, the year of his death, the Institute led an international cooperative effort to assess the value of information technology in public infrastructures: health care; road transportation; education; communications and public safety.

Business career

John Diebold & Associates soon grew into The Diebold Group, which played a unique and often central role in the development of the information technology industry. John Diebold and his company were responsible for the creation of new products and services as well as in the definition of the IT role in the management of businesses and governments. His original wish to play a role in and to contribute to the development of a few of the formative issues that changes the world in which we live was fulfilled. Starting at the founding of the firm, in 1954, Diebold found himself in a unique leadership role of teacher and concepts innovator. He recognized at the outset that computers meant much more than mechanization of existing systems. Instead, they would open hitherto undreamed of opportunities to do new things. Only a few years after the Diebold Group's founding, books were being written about John Diebold, his ideas and his firm. Central to all of this was the insight that for computers to achieve their potential they had to be viewed as management and strategy tools. The firm's leadership was evident not only in technical innovations but also in the highest level of strategic planning. Working through and with the senior managements of the largest and best run corporations in the world, John Diebold and his firm had an impact that went far beyond their small professional firm. There was a multiplier effect with widespread dissemination through these organizations, their managements, employees and customers. From its founding to its sale in 1991, the firm and John Diebold had a continuing role in the creation and dissemination of new ideas, insights and the introduction of new paradigms. An example was the concepts that talent is capital and its consequences were a key to success in the new world that took shape. From the beginning Diebold contributed to new expectations for the delivery of public services and to what citizens could expect from governments. The firm provided counsel to over 100 cities, most U.S. states, several foreign governments and major corporations, in the U.S. and abroad. John Diebold was active in public as well as private pursuits. He was a trustee of the

Carnegie Institution The Carnegie Institution of Washington (the organization's legal name), known also for public purposes as the Carnegie Institution for Science (CIS), is an organization in the United States established to fund and perform scientific research. T ...

of Washington, the Committee for Economic Development, the National Planning Association, a Fellow of the International Academy of Management, a Member, Executive Committee, the

Public Agenda Foundation In public relations and communication science, publics are groups of individual people, and the public (a.k.a. the general public) is the totality of such groupings. This is a different concept to the sociological concept of the ''Öffentlichkei ...

; Chairman, U.S.East Asian History of Science and Vice Chairman of the Academy for Educational Development. He also served as Vice Chairman to John J. McCloy at the American Council on Germany. He had six honorary degrees, the Legion of Honor from France and was decorated by the governments of Italy, Germany and Jordan. He also received numerous professional awards.

Books

* Automation: The advent of the Automatic Factory, Van Nostrand, 1952 * Making the future work: Unleashing our powers of innovation for the decades ahead, Simon and Schuster, 1984 The Papers and Speeches of John Diebold, 1957-1998 * Volume 1. Beyond Automation: Managerial Problems of an Exploding Technology. Foreword: Peter F. Drucker. McGraw Hill, 1964; Republished by PraegerPublishers, 1970 * Volume 2. Man and the Computer: Technology as an Agent of Social Change, Frederick A. Praeger, 1969 * Volume 3. Business Decisions and Technological Change, Praeger Publisher, 1970 * Volume 4. The Role of Business in Society. Foreword by James L. Hayes, Chairman, American Management Associations. American Management Associations, 1982 * Volume 5. Managing Information: The Challenge and the Opportunity, Foreword by Thornton F. Bradshaw,Chairman, RCA Corporation. American Management Associations, 1985 * Volume 6. Business in the Age of Information. Foreword by Russell Palmer, Dean, The Wharton School. American Management Associations, 1985 * Volume 7. Technology and Public Policy. Meeting Society's 21st Century Needs. Management Science Publishing Co., 1997 * Volume 8. Maintaining Profitability in an Increasingly Complex Environment. Management Science Publishing Co., 1998 * Volume 9. Information Technology in the 21st Century, Management Science Publishing Co., 1998 Editor, World of the Computer, for Random House in 1973
ASIN: B000MHGD7K

References

Additional references

Managerial Innovations of John Diebold. An Analysis of Their Content and Dissemination
by Mary Stephens-Caldwell Henderson, LeBaron Foundation, 1966
John Diebold. Breaking the Confines of the Possible
by Wilbur Cross. The Future Makers. James H. Heineman, 1965
Agent of Change. Forty Years of the Diebold Group
Edited by Liesa Bing and Ralph E. Weindling. Diebold Institute for Public Policy Studies, 2001
The John Diebold Lectures
by David W. Ewing. Harvard University Press.

by Richard Waters. Financial Times. December 28, 2005. Accessed September 29, 2013
John Diebold on management
by Carl Heyel, Prentice Hall, 1972
Other People’s Business
by Howard Klein, Mason/Charter Publishers, 1976. John Diebold and his firm are principal subject in book.
Starting at the Top
by John Mack Carter and Joan Feeney. William Morrow & Co., 1985. John Diebold one of subjects in book. *

Archives and records

John Diebold papers
at Baker Library Special Collections, Harvard Business School.
The Diebold Group, Client Reports
at

Charles Babbage Institute The IT History Society (ITHS) is an organization that supports the history and scholarship of information technology by encouraging, fostering, and facilitating archival and historical research. Formerly known as the Charles Babbage Foundation, ...

, University of Minnesota. Contains nearly 1000 client reports (1954-1990), prepared for the Diebold Group's corporate clients, government, and other public clients. The reports assess whether and how companies can make use of computers, sometimes including specific recommendations for computer purchases based on predictions for automation in a particular industry.

External links

* * John Diebold as an author
John Diebold ist Mister Automation
*
John Diebold Papers. Baker Library Historical Collections. Harvard Business School.Harvard University Library; OASIS: Online Archival Search Information System. Mss:867 1906-2003 D559

Swarthmore Friends Historical Library
Collected Papers of Individual Alumni, John T. Diebold Papers. Call number: R66/R003/002
Carnegie Institution Trustee Emeritus John Diebold dies at age 79
Carnegie Institution for Science. {{DEFAULTSORT:Diebold, John 1926 births 2005 deaths People from Weehawken, New Jersey Swarthmore College alumni Diebold Harvard Business School alumni United States Merchant Marine Academy alumni Weehawken High School alumni