Conceptual history is a scholarly perspective that investigates the emergence and use of scientific and institutional concepts. Of particular interest in the approach are the ways in which concepts shape and constitute the meaning of various phenomena. The purpose of the present article is to introduce conceptual history to Finnish administrative studies and to apply it to an analysis of Finnish management thought at a specific moment in time. A close reading of key textbooks from the 1950’s illustrates the potential of conceptual historical analysis. The Finnish concept johtaminen (‘management, managing’) was not widely used in the books. Instead, concepts such as hoito (‘care, conduct’), johto (‘leadership, management’) and hallinta (‘control, handling’) were employed instead to denote the administrative phenomenon. Furthermore, the texts strove to legitimise management mainly in terms of the moral character of managers and the management process. Overall, the paper argues for the necessity of paying closer attention to the role of concepts and their divergent uses in the study of the history of management ideas.