Management is how businesses organize and direct workflow, operations, and employees to meet

company goals. The primary goal of management is to create an environment that lets employees work
efficiently and productively. A solid organizational structure serves as a guide for workers and establishes
the tone and focus of their work.

What is management?

Management is the coordination and administration of tasks to achieve a goal. Such administration
activities include setting the organization’s strategy and coordinating the efforts of staff to accomplish
these objectives through the application of available resources. Management can also refer to the
seniority structure of staff members within an organization.

To be an effective manager, you’ll need to develop a set of skills, including planning, communication,
organization and leadership. You will also need extensive knowledge of the company’s goals and how to
direct employees, sales and other operations to accomplish them.

Goal-oriented process

An essential aspect of management is to combine individual efforts and direct them towards achieving
organisational goals. These goals differ from organisation to organisation. For example, an organisation
can have a profit motive whereas a social work organisation might have a goal of eradicating illiteracy
among children. Management recognises these goals and aims to fulfil them.

d and works towards these goals. Further, this is done in terms of problems to be solved, decisions to be
made, plans to be established, budgets to be prepared, responsibilities to be assigned and authority to
be delegated.

Management of people: Another dimension of management is concerned with getting work done from
people, by assigning work to worthy employees who can work effectively towards the realisation of
organisational goals. This is achieved by ensuring that the strength is highlighted and the weakness is
driven out of the equation. It further has two dimensions- a) dealing with people as individuals with
diverse needs and behaviours and b) dealing with individuals perceiving them as a part of a wider group
of people.

Management of operations: As every organisation aims at the completion of work, they also have a
particular product or service to provide with respect to their domain of operation. Note that this is met
with the help of a production process. Management also looks after a production process of an
organisation that transforms the input with the help of technology required into the output
for consumption. Interestingly, this is linked to both management of work and people.

Continuous Process

We now know that there are various functions of management. These are- planning, organising,
directing, staffing and controlling. As a matter of fact, a manager performs all these functions
simultaneously. Although these functions are separate, management is concerned with performing all of
them simultaneously all the time. Consequently, management is a dynamic and continuous process.

Group Activity
An organisation consists of a large number of individuals having different reasons and purposes to join.
Again these individual differ based on their needs and behaviours. However, it is important to realise
that these diverse individuals work together towards the achievement of the organisational goals.
Management diverts the individual efforts towards the right direction. Further, effective management
enables all the individuals to grow and develop as their needs and opportunities change.

Dynamic Function

An organisation has to adapt to the environment in order to succeed. Thus management is dynamic in
nature and adapts to the ever-changing social, economic and political conditions. A famous example of
this is how McDonald’s had to change its menu to serve and emerge as a major fast food giant in the
Indian market.

Intangible Force

Management cannot be touched or it isn’t tangible. However effective management can be easily felt.
Evidently, if there is order instead of chaos within an organisation, the employees are happy and the
organisational goals are being organised it can be easily said that there exists good management.

What are the four basic functions of management?

There are four generally accepted functions of management: planning, organizing,
leading and controlling. These functions work together in the creation, execution
and realization of organizational goals. The four functions of management can be
considered a process where each function builds on the previous function. To be
successful, management needs to follow the four functions of management in the
proper order.

Managers first need to develop a plan, then organize their resources and delegate
responsibilities to employees according to the plan, then lead others to efficiently
carry out the plan, and finally evaluate the plan’s effectiveness as it is being
executed and make any necessary adjustments.

 Planning
 Organizing
 Leading
 Controlling

1. Planning

In the planning stage, managers establish organizational goals and create a

course of action to achieve them. During the planning phase, management makes
strategic decisions to set a direction for the organization. Managers can
brainstorm different alternatives to achieve the objective before choosing the best
course of action. While planning, managers typically conduct an in-depth analysis
of the organization’s current state of affairs, taking into consideration its vision
and mission and evaluating what resources are available to meet organizational
objectives.

While planning, managers usually evaluate internal and external factors that may
affect the execution of the plan, such as economic growth, customers and
competitors. They also establish a realistic timeline for achieving the goal or goals
based on the organization’s available finances, personnel and resources.
Managers may have to take additional steps, such as seeking approval from other
departments, executives or their board of directors before proceeding with the
plan.

There are several approaches to planning:

 Strategic planning: This type of planning is often carried out by an

organization’s top management and usually creates goals for the
entire organization. It analyzes threats to the organization,
evaluates the organization’s strengths and weaknesses and creates
a plan of how the organization can best compete in its
environment. Strategic planning usually has a long timeframe of
three years or more.
 Tactical planning: Tactical planning is the shorter-term planning of
an objective that will take a year or less to achieve. It is usually
carried out by an organization’s middle management. Tactical
planning is usually aimed at a specific area or department of the
organization such as its facilities, production, finance, marketing or
personnel.
 Operational planning: Operational planning is the process of
using tactical planning to achieve strategic planning and goals.
Operational planning creates a timeframe for putting a portion of
the strategic goal into practice operationally.
2. Organizing

The purpose of organizing is to distribute the resources and delegate tasks to

personnel to achieve the goals established in the planning stage. Managers may
need to work with other departments of the organization, such as finance and
human resources, to organize the budget and staffing. During the organizing
stage, managers strive to create a work environment conducive to productivity.
Managers typically take employees’ motivation and aptitude into account to match
employees with roles and tasks that best fit their abilities.

When assigning team member roles, managers should explain and ensure that
employees understand their individual duties. To help employees feel engaged
and productive, managers should ensure that employees are assigned an
appropriate amount of work and an appropriate amount of time to complete their
work.

Here are some examples of the organizing function:

 If the company’s brand manager works part-time and the

organization’s goal is to launch a new advertising campaign for a
product, the brand manager may not take on the significant
responsibility of managing the campaign besides their regular
duties. The company may hire an advertising agency to help with
the promotion of the product.
 If a company’s sales in a geographic area have grown exponentially,
management may plan to split the territory in two and need to
divide the current team working in the territory and hire additional
staff members as needed.

3. Leading

Leading consists of motivating employees and influencing their behavior to

achieve organizational objectives. Leading focuses on managing people, such as
individual employees, teams and groups rather than tasks. Though managers may
direct team members by giving orders and directing to their team, managers who
are successful leaders usually connect with their employees by using interpersonal
skills to encourage, inspire and motivate team members to perform to the best of
their abilities.
Managers can foster a positive working environment by identifying moments
when employees need encouragement or direction and using positive
reinforcement to give praise when employees have done their jobs well.

Managers usually incorporate different leadership styles and change their

management style to adapt to different situations. Examples of situational
leadership styles include:

 Directing: The manager leads by deciding with little input from the
employee. This is an effective leadership style for new employees
who need a lot of initial direction and training.
 Coaching: The manager is more receptive to input from employees.
They may pitch their ideas to employees to work cooperatively and
build trust with team members. This style of leadership is effective
for individuals who need managerial support to further develop
their skills.
 Supporting: The manager decides with team members but focuses
more on building relationships within the team. This style of
leadership is effective for employees who have fully developed skills
but are sometimes inconsistent in their performance.
 Delegating: The leader provides a minimum of guidance to
employees and is more concerned with the vision of the project
than day-to-day operations. This style of leadership is effective with
employees able to work and perform tasks on their own with little
guidance. The leader can focus more on high-level goals than on
tasks.

Related: 15 Leadership Qualities That Make a Great Leader

4. Controlling

Controlling is the process of evaluating the execution of the plan and making
adjustments to ensure that the organizational goal is achieved. During the
controlling stage, managers perform tasks such as training employees as
necessary and managing deadlines. Managers monitor employees and evaluate
the quality of their work. They can conduct performance appraisals and give
employees feedback, providing positive remarks on what they are doing well and
suggestions for improvement. They may also offer pay raise incentives to high-
performing employees.

Managers may need to make adjustments such as:

Budget adjustments

Managers monitor the budget and resources to ensure that they are using the
resources available and not going over budget. For example, a manager may
notice that she is going over budget on a project but be unsure what is causing the
project to go over budget. In this situation, she will need to identify whether there
is a general problem with overspending or whether one department, in particular,
is going over budget. Once the manager identifies the source of the overspending,
she must take action to curb overall spending and make cuts as necessary to
balance the budget.

Staffing adjustments

Managers may need to make challenging decisions such as whether to reassign an

employee who produces low-quality work to a different task or dismiss them from
a project. They may also need to add additional team members to meet an
organizational goal if they conclude that the team is understaffed. If this is the
case, they may also need to consult with organization executives to secure more
funding.