Are
they not the same? Or are they quite different? This is something for you to ponder.
I would suggest that management pertains to organizations and resources and
supervision addresses the direct reporting relationships among employees.
What do you think about this? [email protected]
Management
can be defined as the attainment of organizational goals in an effective and
efficient manner through four functions commonly referred to as planning,
organizing, leading and controlling. Managing is
generally considered universal in all profit and non-profit organizations
because it uses resources to accomplish goals.
Now, here is more to ponder�what is meant by effective
and efficient and what are those four functions all about?
When
planning, we deal with issues of current status and desired future
state, goals, tasks and how resources will be used to get to the desired
future, even if that future looks pretty much like the present. I throw in
the last comment because quite often organizations get so caught up in change
(for change sake sometimes) that people forget to take care of what they’ve
already got. Of the four functions, I consider planning the most critical and
usually the most neglected. I relate this to what a good carpenter does:
measures twice and cuts once.
Organizing addresses how people in
an organization will accomplish the plan. This involves assigning goals and
tasks and allocation of resources. Important to the assignments is
establishing clear responsibility and accountability.
I
see leading as intimately related to decision-making, something that
isn�t particularly well done in most organizations (in my opinion and from my
experience). Leading, officially, could be defined as the use of influence to
motivate employees to achieve organizational goals. I am concerned with the
idea that managers �motivate� people. Perhaps you would like to take a shot
at why I would be concerned about this. [email protected]
I
believe the most significant component in effective leadership and clarity
about decision-making, that is, who makes what decisions and how these are
made, and who influences what decisions and how. I’m sure we will be talking
more about leadership later.
Controlling is not, as some folks
might think and do, is not making people do what you want and if they don’t,
punish them in some way. Controlling is really a process of creating
information and measuring systems to determine progress towards desired
goals. If the organizing and leading is going awry in some way, it is nice to
detect this as soon as possible so corrective action can be take. You might
want to become familiar with Deming’s “Plan, do, check, act” as a
good model for this.
Now,
let’s talk about organizational performance and this is where we can get back
to effective and efficient. First, let’s describe an organization as a method
to bring together knowledge, people and resources such as raw materials to
perform tasks that one individual could not do alone. Have you ever thought
how many hundreds of people are brought together to create a program like
Microsoft Word or Adobe PageMaker? An organization is a social entity, which means it is made up of two or more people,
is goal directed such as making a
profit, and deliberately structured
so that tasks are appropriately assigned to individuals and groups.
Okay,
now effective and efficient: effectiveness is the degree to which the
organization achieves goals, or �are we doing the right things� like
providing customers with valued received; and efficiency pertains to the
amount of resources used to produce a product or service; �Are we doing
things right?�
In
a variety of UOP textbooks, students will find plenty of information about
types of managers. This is all pretty well defined and I don’t need to dwell
on it here, other that to mention that management positions are both vertical
(first line, mid and senior/executive) and horizontal (basically line and
staff).
More
importantly, I would want you to focus on management skills and the
deployment of these skills in the various positions described as types. These
skills can be categorized as conceptual, human and technical. Now, some folks
will get into a debate on which set of skills is most important. What I would
like you to think about is the application of skills in the various types. I
might suggest that all are important, but each skill set is more important at
times. While you are at this, also pay particular attention to manager roles,
which have a lot to do with behaviors.
Back
to decision-making: This is a role that I consider critical for any manager
at any level and in any function. I believe clarity about this is essential
for healthy organizations where “empowerment” is more than a
buzzword. Let me elaborate by borrowing from some of my own work:
The
three components of cooperation:
–
Who makes what decisions and how they are made, and who influences
what decisions and how this is exercised. .
–
Eliminating the gap between intentions and interpretations.
–
Understanding diversity in work behavior styles (patterns).
How
best do we gain cooperation in the workplace? For me, the answer has three
components. First, I believe this happens when people are clear about
authority in terms of who makes what decisions and how they are made, and
when people are clear about who influences what decisions and how this
influence is exercised. This clarity
is an essential ingredient (perhaps the only one) of “empowerment.”
The
second component in cooperation is clarity in the interpersonal communication
process, including skills in mitigating or eliminating the disparity between
intentions and interpretations.
The
third component is an understanding of our own work behavior styles and those
of the people we are associated with, whether in intact work groups or
project teams. By work behavior styles (or patterns), we address, among other
things, individual decision-making strategies, amount of information needed
before starting a task or project, approaches to dealing with change and
more.
Depending
on how these three components are operating in any workplace environment,
they will either be the sources of unresolved conflict or cooperation.
I do want to
close this with some thoughts about individual transitions from
non-management jobs into management. Typically, the most critical and
toughest transition is into that first management position, typically first
line of some kind regardless of title. This is a letting go process and
development of boundaries involving people with whom one worked with and
quite often developed close relationships. A separation must happen and new
relationships must be formed if a new �manager� is to succeed. This can be
difficult enough that some first time managers choose to �go back,� and some
flounder for a long time before they figure things out. In sum, you cannot be
someone’s boss and a buddy at the same time. I’m certainly open for your
�push back� on this comment.������������������������������