Management — The process of reaching organizational goals by working with and through people and other organizational resources.

Management Functions — Activities that make up the management process. The four basic management activities are planning, organizing, influencing , and controlling.

  1. Planning — involves choosing tasks that must be performed to attain organizational goals , outlining how the tasks must be performed, and indicating when they should be performed. Focuses on attaining goals.
  2. Organizing — organizing creates a mechanism to put plans into action.
  3. Influencing — this function also commonly referred to as motivating, leading, directing, or actuating — is concerned primarily with people within organizations. The ultimate purpose of influencing is to increase productivity.
  4. Controlling — is the management function for which managers:
  • Gather information that measures recent performance within organization.
  • Compare present performance to reestablished performance standards.
  • From this comparison, determine if the organization should be modified to meet reestablished standards.

Managers continually gather information, make their comparisons, and then try to find new ways of improving production through organizational modification.

Organizational Resources — All assets available for activation during the production process; they include:

  1. Human resources — are the people who work for an organization.
  2. Monetary resources — are amounts of money that managers use to purchase goods and services for the organization.
  3. Raw material resources — used directly in the manufacturing of products (ex: rubber is a raw material that Goodyear would purchase with its monetary resources and use directly in manufacturing tires)
  4. Capital resources — are machines or equipment used during the manufacturing process.

Managerial Effectiveness — Refers to the management's use of organizational resources in meeting organizational goals. The closer the organization comes to achieving its goals, the more effective its managers are considered to be.

Managerial Efficiency — The proportion of total organizational resources used during the production process. The higher this proportion, the more efficient the manager. The more resources wasted or unused during this production process (also the human effort), the more inefficient the manager.

Universality of Management — means that the principles of management are applicable to all types of organizations and organizational levels.

Career — is a sequence of work-related positions occupied by a person over the course of a lifetime. As people accumulate successful experiences in one position, they generally develop abilities and attitudes that qualify them to hold more advanced positions.

Careers are generally viewed as evolving through a series of stages. These evolutionary stages: exploration, establishment, maintenance, and decline.

Exploration Stage — Is the first stage in career evolution; it occurs at the beginning of a career, when the individual is typically 15-25 years of age, and is characterized by self­analysis and the exploration of different types of available jobs. (исследование)

Establishment Stage — Is the second stage of career evolution; individuals of about 25-45 years of age typically start to become more productive, or higher performers. (основывать)

Maintenance Stage — Is the third stage in career evolution; individuals of about 45-65 years of age show either Increased performance (career growth), stabilized performance (career maintenance), or decreased performance (career stagnation). (поддерживать)

Decline Stage — The fourth and last stage in career evolution; it occurs near retirement age, when individuals of about 65 years of age show declining productivity. (отклонять)

Special career issues:

  • Women managers (lack the social contacts, families, households, sexual harassment)
  • Dual career couples (flexibility, organization, difficult have it «all») career, handing home job-oriented issues, negotiating child care, scheduled shared activities, limit social lives, mutual career advancement.

Management Skill —Is the ability to carry out the process of reaching organizational goals by working with and through the people and other organizational resources.

Technical Skill — Skills involving the ability to apply specialized knowledge and expertise to work-related techniques and procedures.

Human Skills — Skills involving the ability to build cooperation with the team being led. Conceptual Skills — Skills involving the ability to see the organization as a whole.

Task-related Activities — Are management efforts aimed at carrying out critical management related duties in organizations. Short term planning, clarifying objectives of jobs in organizations and monitoring operations and performance.

People-related Activities — Are management efforts aimed at managing people in organizations. Providing support and encouragement to others, recognition for achievements and contributions, developing skill and confidence, consulting and solve problems.

Change-related Activities — Are management efforts aimed at modifying organizational components. Monitoring organization’s external environment, proposing new strategies and vision, innovative thinking and taking risks to promote needed change.

Law of the situation — indicates that managers must continually analyze the unique circumstances within their organizations and apply management concepts to fit their circumstances.

Highlights — appear throughout the text to focus the attention or important contemporary management themes: global management, business or corporate ethics, diversity in organizations, management in various industries, and information technology.

The Global Arena — Modern managers are faced with many challenges involving global business.

Ethics and Social Responsibility — Modern managers face the challenge of developing and maintaining social responsibility and ethical practices that are appropriate for their particular organizations.

Diversity Counts — Modern managers constantly face the challenge of handling situations involving diversity in organizations. Diversity is defined as differences in people such as gender, age, ethnicity, nationality, ability.

Across Industries — Managers apply management principles daily in many different industries across the world. How managers react to the varied situations that confront them. Information Today — Recently developed technology surrounding the development of the Internet has significantly impacted how modern managers receive, analyze, store and disseminate information.

How the Pros Do It

One of the most powerful ways to learn how to manage is to see how practicing managers apply their skill when faced with various organizational challenges.

Similar posts: