Management: Definitions
Management: Definitions
Management: Definitions
Definitions
Directors and managers should have the authority and responsibility to make
decisions to direct an enterprise when given the authority.
The size of management can range from one person in a small firm to hundreds
or thousands of managers in multinational companies.
In large firms, the board of directors formulates the policy that the chief executive
officer implements.
Topic
Basic functions
Management operates through five basic functions: planning, organizing, coordinating,
commanding, and controlling.
Planning: Deciding what needs to happen in the future and generating plans for
action.
Organizing: Making sure the human and nonhuman resources are put into place
Basic roles
Skills
The mission of the business is the most obvious purposewhich may be, for
example, to make soap.
The vision of the business reflects its aspirations and specifies its intended
direction or future destination.
The objectives of the business refers to the ends or activity that is the goal of a
certain task.
The business's policy is a guide that stipulates rules, regulations and objectives,
and may be used in the managers' decision-making. It must be flexible and easily
interpreted and understood by all employees.
The business's strategy refers to the coordinated plan of action it takes and
resources it uses to realize its vision and long-term objectives. It is a guideline to
managers, stipulating how they ought to allocate and use the factors of production to
the business's advantage. Initially, it could help the managers decide on what type of
business they want to form.
All policies and strategies must be discussed with all managerial personnel and
staff.
Managers must understand where and how they can implement their policies and
strategies.
A planning unit must be created to ensure that all plans are consistent and that
policies and strategies are aimed at achieving the same mission and objectives.
All policies must be discussed with all managerial personnel and staff that is required in
the execution of any departmental policy.
They give mid and lower-level managers a good idea of the future plans for each
department in an organization.
A framework is created whereby plans and decisions are made.
Mid and lower-level management may add their own plans to the business's
strategies.
Levels
Most organizations have three management levels: first-level, middle-level, and toplevel managers. These managers are classified in a hierarchy of authority, and perform
different tasks. In many organizations, the number of managers in every level
resembles a pyramid. Each level is explained below in specifications of their different
responsibilities and likely job titles.
Top-level management
The top consists of the board of directors (including non-executive
directors and executive directors), president, vice-president, CEOs and other members
of the C-level executives. They are responsible for controlling and overseeing the entire
organization. They set a tone at the top and develop strategic plans, company policies,
and make decisions on the direction of the business. In addition, top-level managers
play a significant role in the mobilization of outside resources and are accountable to
the shareholders and general public.
Middle-level managers
Consist of general managers, branch managers and department managers. They are
accountable to the top management for their department's function. They devote more
time to organizational and directional functions. Their roles can be emphasized as
executing organizational plans in conformance with the company's policies and the
objectives of the top management, they define and discuss information and policies
from top management to lower management, and most importantly they inspire and
provide guidance to lower level managers towards better performance. Their functions
include:
Design and implement effective group and inter-group work and information
systems.
Design and implement reward systems that support cooperative behavior. They
also make decision and share ideas with top managers.
First-level managers
Consist of supervisors, section leaders, foremen, etc. They focus on controlling and
directing. They usually have the responsibility of assigning employees tasks, guiding
and supervising employees on day-to-day activities, ensuring quality and quantity
production, making recommendations, suggestions, and up channeling employee
problems, etc. First-level managers are role models for employees that provide:
Basic supervision
Motivation
Career planning
Performance feedback
Training
Universities around the world, offer bachelor's and advanced degrees, diplomas and
certificates in management, generally within their colleges of business and business
schools but also in other related departments. There is also an increase in online
management education and training in the form of E-learning.
USA
At the graduate level students may choose to specialize in major subareas of
management such as entrepreneurship,human resources, international
business, organizational behavior, organizational theory, strategic management.
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accounting, corporate finance, entertainment, global management, healthcare
management, investment management, Leaders in Sustainability and real estate.
Historical development
Some see management (by definition) as late-modern (in the sense of late modernity)
conceptualization. On those terms it cannot have a pre-modern history, only harbingers
(such as stewards).
Early writing
While management (according to some definitions) has existed for millennia, several
writers have created a background of works that assisted in modern management
theories.
19th century
Classical economists such as Adam Smith (17231790) and John Stuart Mill (1806
1873) provided a theoretical background to resource-allocation, production,
and pricing issues. About the same time, innovators like Eli Whitney (1765
1825), James Watt (17361819), and Matthew Boulton (17281809) developed
elements of technical production such asstandardization, qualitycontrol procedures, cost-accounting, interchangeability of parts, and work-planning.
20th century
By about 1900 one finds managers trying to place their theories on what they regarded
as a thoroughly scientific basis (seescientism for perceived limitations of this belief).
Examples include Henry R. Towne's Science of management in the 1890s,Frederick
Winslow Taylor's The Principles of Scientific Management (1911), Frank and Lillian
Gilbreth's Applied motion study (1917), and Henry L. Gantt's charts (1910s). J. Duncan
wrote the first college management-textbook in 1911. The first comprehensive theories
of management appeared around 1920. The Harvard Business School offered the
firstMaster of Business Administration degree (MBA) in 1921.
Peter Drucker (19092005) wrote one of the earliest books on applied
management: Concept of the Corporation (published in 1946). It resulted from Alfred
Sloan (chairman of General Motors until 1956) commissioning a study of
the organisation. Drucker went on to write 39 books, many in the same vein.
Towards the end of the 20th century, business management came to consist of six
separate branches, namely:
1. financial management
2. human resource management
3. information technology management (responsible for management information
systems)
4. marketing management
5. operations management or production management
6. strategic management
21st century
In the 21st century observers find it increasingly difficult to subdivide management into
functional categories in this way. More and more processes simultaneously involve
several categories. Instead, one tends to think in terms of the various processes, tasks,
and objects subject to management.