The Interrelationships of the Four Management Functions
Over recent years companies have become less dependent on paper and more dependent on technology. Take American Honda Motors for example; the Davenport Parts facility recently converted computer systems to more efficiently manage its inventory. Prior to its new system months of preparation was needed in order to ensure a smooth change over. Without the four basic functions of management all working together success would not have been possible.
As Schermerhorn states in Management planning, organizing, leading, and controlling are the tools needed by managers to accomplish performance goals. It is crucial that managers be able to recognize and act upon problems or opportunities as they arise. Planning is perhaps the cornerstone of the four processes. All good processes were at some point given great detail so as to anticipate possible problems and solutions to those problems. When the Honda Motor Company decided it needed to refine its inventory they didn't just jump at the first idea that was proposed; they first set their objectives and discussed ways to meet those objectives. After giving careful consideration to processes and the streamlining of those processes human error rose as the top need for change. Sounds simple you might respond; in reality it is much more complicated.
Once the decisions are made organizing becomes the crucial function in order to facilitate completing any plan. In the case of Honda it was decided that a team of conversion specialists would be assembled from various centers across the US. That new team would be fully trained on how the new system is implemented and facilitate all conversion functions. Prior to any facility being converted the new team spent eight months learning, researching, and performing pre-installations. The new team assembled wasn't the only people involved in the process, each parts center was given some guidelines for preparation and tasks that needed to be accomplished.
At this stage in the process it was up to the center manager to provide leadership and facilitate all pre-installation needs. One month prior to the new system being implemented a center manager from one of the already converted centers was brought on to motivate and generate a positive atmosphere about the new changes. Since he had been through the process previously he could explain and help prevent past mistakes.
Five months prior to the scheduled conversion date inventory began its systematic routine of counting certain inventory that had potential for problems.
Organization design is a formal, guided process for integrating the people, information and technology of an organization. It is used to match the form of the organization as closely as possible to the purpose of the organization. This design process seeks to improve and facilitate the efforts of members within the organization. With respect to FMC Corporation’s Green River, Wyoming facility, under the guidance of this entity’s site manager, Kenneth Dailey, the design should be approached as an internal changes within the organization with the entity’s members working together to define the needs of the organization then create systems to meet those needs most effectively.
Every organization and business enterprise has a dream of making the highest profit in all their ventures as well as minimizing all the inputs while at the same time maintaining the quality of their products and services. This goal cannot be achieved without the proper and powerful management team that directs all the organization operations and calls the shots. Management comprises of procedures and processes for rationalizing and connecting the activities of the business in order to achieve defined objectives and goals. In most cases, management is included as a fundamental of production process in the same category as machines, raw materials, and cash (Niederle, 2013). However, for an organization’s management to effectively and efficiently manage all its activities that include staffing, organizing, coordinating and controlling, it has to be conversant with rules of the land regarding
Managing transformational at National Computer Operations is an article discussing the dilemmas faced when a company is forced to implement changes within a two year timeframe in order to compete with other emerging computer technology companies. NCO’s Managing Director Gar Finvold, decided to review NCO’s market position and to look for improvement opportunities that change implementation enhancements would ensure that NCO would emerge and maintain their position as the leading computer support services firm.
According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (2014), “Planning is the process of setting goals, creating organizational strategies and/or outlining tasks and innovative ways to accomplish the goals you have set in order to be a successful organization.” In the world of management or healthcare management planning is a vital importance in that it helps to focus, prepare and clarify the daily projects and assignments that may help an organization become a successful entity. Planning can also be very important in many other ways such as, saving time...
Murray and Dicroce (2003) suggest that management is a process that uses resources to achieve specific goals effectively; basic management functions including planning, organising, coordinating, directing and controlling. The term of manager can be appointed to the person to plan, organise, coordinate, supervise, negotiate, evaluate and use resources available in the best way possible to achieve the best service. Alternativ...
The New England Wire and Cable (NEWC) present a situation that was quite possibly very common amongst many towns and smaller cities in the United States during the mid-1980s to the early 1990s. As large corporations with new technology swept across the country, small town American and its legacy manufactures and companies struggled to keep pace. This case study references the New England Wire and Cable Company that in some ways was resistant to change. John P. Kotter’s article, Why Transformation Efforts Fail, outlines eight classic errors that are made in the transformation process. Likewise, Kotter’s article also outlines eight steps that could spearhead transformation within an organization. There was clearly a commonly hidden problem within the NEWC the so many times goes unseen. That problem was the leadership of NEWC.
The first function of management is planning. "Planning is systematically making decisions about the goals and activities that an individual, a group, a work unit, or overall organization will pursue." (Bateman & Snell) In my organization, planning takes up the most time. Objectives must be laid out, potential products must be examined and the timing and type of marketing must all be planned out before we provide our product to our customers. This function should be first and foremost to all individuals involved in the organization. Poor planning will result in your organizations demise.
Setup early warning system to inform customer about a potential stock out and supplier about a delayed order from CMO. This will help in reducing stock out situations.
Change initiatives are time intensive and exorbitant, which portentously influence an organization’s push toward success. And almost fifty percent of these initiatives are unsuccessful. Given that the certainty of change is inevitable, organizations will be required to determine how to effectively acclimate and endure change. Each tactical change in plans organizations are produced via programs and developments, and thriving organizations manage change by managing their developments and programs effectively.
This research has asked us to look into three different styles of management and find real life examples of companies or individuals who have or are currently using such styles of management. To begin we will take a look into the use of an autocratic style of management versus a participative. In this portion we will look into Leona Helmsley and her chain of hotels. Once this potion is completed, our next section will be looking into a centralized style of management versus a decentralized style. In this section of the research, we will be looking into Apple Inc and how they have built an empire with a centralized style of managing philosophy. Finally, in the final section of the research we will be taking a look at how Google has created an informal environment in which employees have direct access to executives and have the ability to share thoughts and ideas that are taken serious and to the heart.
However, some influential management authors believe that the classical management functions need to be update. Williams (2005, p. 7) updated the management functions and came out with four functions: making things happen; meeting the competition; organizing people, projects and process; and leading. To make things happen, it is essential to determine goals, planning ways to attain the goals, gathering and managing needed information to make superior decisions and also controlling performance to enable corrective action to take place if performance worsens. This function actually combined Fayol’s idea of planning and controlling. The thought of determining things to accomplish and developing plans to achieve goals is similar to function of planning suggested by Fayol, which is to define goals, establish strategy and develop plans to implement the strategy in order to reach the goals. Besides, Williams mentioned about controlling performance and corrective action, which is corresponding to Fayol’s classical management functions of controlling. Controlling, according to Fayol, involves observing organization performance and take action if necessary to ensure that goals are to be achieved. Nevertheless, the action of gathering and managing needed information to enable good decisions to be made is not stated in classical management functions. Based on the updated functions, organizing people, projects and processes included consideration of people issues and work processes. At the same time, Fayol mentioned organizing, which is the management process of determining best way to arrange organization’s resources and activities. They actually have the same meaning where both are about locating organization’s resources, which are the employees and also the work processes or activities. The Learning Company, a company that develops and markets games and software, was purchased by toy company Mattel. It was experiencing loss after three years of the purchase because each department in the company works independently and do not share resources.
Change was and continues to be an important component of these processes that I am responsible for because it allows me to develop efficiencies and economies of scale. As an example, I managed a team that implemented the installation of the Graduate Admission’s Customer Relationship Management system. The implementation enabled the Graduate Admissions office to more effectively track and plan the movement of interested candidates from inquiry to application in one system. This implementation and deployment ultimately altered the way two separate offices conduct business. The implementation required changes in practice and was ultimately needed for the continued growth of the Graduate Admissions office.
In any organizations management would have to contend with any unavoidable changes that might take place. New machines, equipment, unstable business environment etc. can bring these changes. Successful implementation of the product therefore depends on the ability of the management to deal with the changes and resolve any emerging conflicts there from.
Since the end of the 19th century, when factory manufacturing became widespread and the size of organisations increased, people have been looking for ways to motivate employees and improve productivity. A need for management ideas arise which lead to classical contributors such as Frederick Taylor and Henri Fayol generating management theories such as Taylor’ Scientific Management and Fayol’s Administrative Management. In the late 1920’s and early 1930’s the Hawthorne studies were conducted where Elton Mayo was the predominate figure and contributed to the Behavioural viewpoint. This brought about a Human Relations Movement which included Douglas McGregor’s Theory X and Theory Y approach. Similarities and differences can be found between the theories due to the relevant time period they were implemented, the motives or goal of the theory and how they view organisations. However the use of contingency theory can help negate the dissimilarities which occur as it allows the relevant elements from each theory to be applied to specific situations.
Management is vital for any organisations regardless of the size and the types of the organisations. In general, management is defined as “the application of planning, organizing, staffing, directing, and controlling functions in the most efficient manner possible to accomplish meaningful organizational objectives.” (John M. Ivancevish and Thomas N. Duening, 2007)