Chapter 1
The Manager's Job
In this chapter, students will gain an understanding of the nature of managerial work. It could be argued that the entire book has a similar purpose. It is therefore necessary to touch upon topics in Chapter 1 that are covered again in later chapters. The chapter provides information on key managerial topics such as (a) the meaning of the term manager, (b) an overview of the process of management, (c) a discussion of managerial roles, and (d) a summary of the major developments in the evolution of management thought. Completion of this lesson and the assigned readings will contribute to meeting the learning objectives for this chapter.
1. Explain what the term manager means and identify different types of manager.
2. Describe the process of management, including the functions of management.
3. Describe the various managerial roles.
4. Identify the basic managerial skills and understand how they can be developed.
5. Describe how managers have to synthesize five mind-sets to accomplish their work.
6. Identify the major developments in the evolution of management thought.
Read Chapter 1 in your textbook Essentials of Management, 9th edition.
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Managers play a vital role in society—they pull together resources to get important things
accomplished.
A manager is a person responsible for the work performance of group members. He or she has the formal authority to commit organizational resources. Management is the process
of using organizational resources to achieve organizational objectives through the functions of planning, organizing and staffing, leading, and controlling.
Jobs are typically divided into three levels:
Top-level managers, or executives, are empowered to make major decisions affecting the present and future of the firm. C-level manager
is a recent term to describe top-level managers because they usually have chief in their title. About one percent of jobs in organizations are truly executive positions.
The layer between top- and first-level managers. Much of their work involves the coordination of work, and the dissemination of information. Middle-management jobs have declined in numbers
as many organizations have downsized but they still play a major role in operating an organization.
Managers who supervise operatives are referred to as first level managers or supervisors. Supervisory jobs have been upgraded in many organizations, as a result of reducing the number of layers of management. The current emphasis on productivity and cost control has also upgraded the supervisory role.
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Managerial jobs can be divided into functional and general managers, administrators, entrepreneurs and small-business owners, and team leaders.
Functional managers supervise the work of employees engaged in specialized activities, such as accounting and quality control. General managers are responsible for the work of several different groups performing a variety of functions. Company presidents and division heads are general managers. Key tasks of general managers include shaping the work environment and crafting a strategic vision.
An administrator is a manager who works in a public or nonprofit organization (including educational institutions) rather than in a business firm.
Entrepreneurs are people who begin a new business based on an innovative idea for a product or service. Entrepreneurs are therefore risk-takers and have an adventuresome spirit. Michael H. Morris says that entrepreneurship is defined by three dimensions: innovativeness, risk taking, and proactiveness. Each of these dimensions can occur in different degrees. A small-business owner operates a small business that is not necessarily entrepreneurial (innovative).
A team leader coordinates the work of a small group of people, while acting as a facilitator and catalyst. Team leaders are found at many organizational levels, and are
also referred to as project managers, process managers, and task-force leaders. All of the managerial jobs describe above vary considerably on the demands placed on the job holder, such as some CEO jobs more demanding and stressful than others.
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Managerial work can be regarded as a process, a series of actions that brings about a goal. To achieve that objective, the manager uses resources and carries out the four managerial functions.
Managers use four types of resources:
1. Human Resources - the employees needed to get the job done.
2. Financial Resources any money used by the organization is classified as a
financial resource.
3. Physical Resources - are the firm's tangible goods and real estate,
including raw materials, office space, production facilities, office equipment, and
vehicles.
4. Information Resources - Data used to accomplish the job are classified as
information resources.
The classical, or standard, functions of management remain a useful way of understanding management.
Involves setting goals and figuring out ways of reaching them.
Planning is the central function of management.
Organizing is the process of making sure the necessary human and physical resources are available to carry out a plan and achieve organizational goals. Staffing involves ensuring there are the necessary human resources to achieve organizational goals. Hiring is a typical staffing activity.
The managerial function of influencing others to achieve
organizational objectives. Leadership is the interpersonal aspect of management.
The managerial function of ensuring that performance conforms to plans. Controlling involves comparing actual performance to a predetermined standard. Computerized controls are widely used.
Managerial level influences how much time managers spend on the four managerial functions. Executives spend more time on strategic (high-level and long-range) planning than do middle- or first-level managers. First-level managers spend the most time in faceto-face leadership of employees.
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A role is an expected set of activities or behaviors stemming from one's job. Roles are
another important way of understanding managerial work.
The two planning roles are strategic (long-range and high-level) planner and operational
(day-by-day) planner.
Five roles fit the organizing function: organizer, liaison, staffing coordinator, resource
allocation, and task delegator.
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Eight roles are part of the leadership function: motivator and coach, figurehead,
spokesperson, negotiator, team builder, team player, technical problem solver, and
entrepreneur.
The monitoring role is virtually identical to controlling. The disturbance handler role can
also be classified as a controlling role because it brings disruptions back in line.
Managerial work has shifted substantially away from the controller and director role to
that of coach, facilitator, and supporter. Many managers today work as partners with
team members to jointly achieve results.
A manager's level of responsibility influences which roles he or she is likely to engage in
most frequently. For example, the most important roles for top-level managers are
liaison, spokesperson, figurehead, and strategic planner
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To be effective, managers need to possess technical, interpersonal, conceptual, diagnostic, and political skills.
Involves an understanding of and proficiency in a specific activity that
involves methods, processes, procedures, or techniques. Budget preparation is an
example of a technical skill.
The manager's ability to work effectively as a team member and to build cooperative effort in the unit. Communication skills are an
example of an important interpersonal skill. An important subset of interpersonal skills for managers is multiculturalism, or the ability to work effectively and conduct business with people from different cultures. Many managers at all levels ultimately fail because their interpersonal skills are not good enough for the demands of the job.
The ability to see the organization as a total entity (the "big picture"). Strategic planning requires conceptual skill.
This involves investigating a problem and then choosing a course of action to solve it.
The ability to acquire the power necessary to reach objectives. Managers high in political skill possess a keens sense of astuteness and understanding of people. Negotiating and forming alliances are examples of political skills. Political skill should be regarded as a supplement to job competence and other basic skills.
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Experience and education—including formal training—are both important for the development of management skills. You can learn managerial concepts from a book, or lecture, and then apply them using the general learning model: (1) conceptual information and behavioral guidelines, (2) conceptual information demonstrated by examples, (3) skill-development exercises, (4) feedback on skill utilization, or performance, from others, and (5) frequent practice of what you have learned, including making adjustments from feedback.
Gosling and Mintzberg believe that managers need to synthesize five different mind-sets
or perspectives at the same time. Each mind-set is association with one of the five key tasks of managers.
The Reflective Mind-Set. Managers need to stop and think about what they are doing, so they can understand the meaning of their actions.
2. Managing Organizations: The Analytical Mind-Set. A manager cannot get
organized without analysis, particularly in a large company.
The Worldly Mind-Set. An effective manager understands the
context, or culture and environment, in which decisions are to be made and actions
taken.
The Collaborative Mind-Set. The effective manager must
manage relationships between and among people.
The Action Mind-Set. The effective manager makes changes
when necessary, but also recognizes that continuity is important.
The successful manager weaves the five mind-sets together to achieve the best result
in a given situation.
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Management as a practice has an almost unlimited history. As a formal study,
management began in the 1700s as part of the Industrial Revolution.
The classical approach to management encompasses scientific management and administrative management. The focus of scientific management was on the application of scientific methods to increase individual workers' productivity. Administrative management was concerned primarily with how organizations should be managed and structured. One of the key contributions of the classical school has been to study management from the framework of planning, organizing, leading, and controlling. Alfred D. Chandler J., the Harvard University business historian, was a key figure in promoting the importance of the classical approach to management. His famous thesis is that a firm's structure is determined or chosen by its structure; other wise the firm becomes inefficient.
The behavioral approach to management emphasizes improving management through the psychological makeup of people. The theme of the behavioral (or human resources) approach is to focus on understanding people. Three direct cornerstones of the human resources approach are the Hawthorne studies, Theory X and Theory Y, and Maslow's need hierarchy.
1. The Hawthorne Studies
Workers in the Hawthorne experiments reacted positively because management cared about them. The Hawthorne effect is the tendency of people to behave differently when they receive attention because they respond to the demands of the situation.
2. Theory X and Theory Y of Douglas McGregor -
Theory X is a set of traditional assumptions about people. Managers who hold these assumptions are pessimistic about workers' capabilities. They believe that workers dislike work, seek to avoid responsibility, are not ambitious, and must be supervised closely. Theory Y is an alternative, and optimistic set of assumptions
3. Maslow's need Hierarchy
(Demonstrated in the image on the right)
Maslow suggested that humans are motivated by efforts to satisfy a hierarchy of needs, ranging from basic needs to those for self-actualization, or reaching one's potential. The need hierarchy prompted managers to think about ways of satisfying a wide range of worker needs to keep them motivated.
The quantitative approach to management is a group of methods to managerial
decision making that is based on the scientific method. Frequently used quantitative
tools and techniques of the quantitative approach include statistics, linear
programming, network analysis, decision trees, and computer simulations. Frederick
Taylor's work provided the foundation for the quantitative approach to management.
However, operations research stemming from World War II is the true beginning of
quantitative approaches to management.
The systems perspective is a way of viewing problems more than a specific approach
to management. It is based on the concept that an organization is a system, or an entity
of interrelated parts. If you adjust one part of the system, other parts will be affected
automatically. From a systems viewpoint, the organization also interacts with the
outside world, transforming inputs (such as money and material) into outputs (such as
products and services). Two other systems concepts are important. Entropy is the
tendency of a system to run down and die if it does not receive fresh inputs from its
environment. Synergy means that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.
The contingency approach of management emphasizes that there is no one best way to manage people or work. A method that leads to high productivity or morale in one situation may not achieve the same results in another. The contingency approach is derived from the study of leadership and organization structures. Common sense also contributes heavily to the contingency approach.
The information technology era began in the 1950s with data processing. By the late 1980s, the impact of information technology and the Internet began to influence how managers manage work and people. Two economists report that the impact of the Internet on business is similar to the impact of electricity at the beginning of the 20th century. An example of a leading-edge approach to management is evidence-based management whereby managers translate principles based on best evidence into management practices.
You have completed this lesson, you may continue to the next item for this week's section.