Evolution of Management Essays

Evolution of Management Essays Evolution of Management Essay Evolution of Management Essay The Evolution of Management Management thinking and practice have evolved over the last century as a result of increased understanding of human and organisational behaviour, the economic climate and historical context and the changes in generations over time. However if we’re really honest, much of what we practice today is due to the consulting industry playing on executives’ fears and aspirations by selling products and services that cause more problems than solutions, and our own human weakness of always looking for a quick fix †¦ even to very complex issues.It’s time to rethink Management. But before we do that, let’s take a look in the rear-view mirror and see how we got to where we are today: 1910s-1940s: Management as Science Management as Science was developed in the early 20th century and focused on increasing productivity and efficiency through standardisation, division of labour, centralisation and hierarchy. A very ‘top down’ management with strict control over people and processes dominated across industries. 1950s-1960s: Functional OrganisationsDue to growing and more complex organisations, the 1950’s and 1960’s saw the emergence of functional organisations and the Human Resource (HR) movement. Managers began to understand the human factor in production and productivity and tools such as goal setting, performance reviews and job descriptions were born. 1970s: Strategic Planning In the 1970’s we changed our focus from measuring function to resource allocation and tools like Strategic Planning (GE), Growth Share Matrix (BCG) and SWOT were used to formalise strategic planning processes.After several decades of ‘best practice’ and ‘one size fits all’ solutions, academics began to developing contingency theories. 1980s: Competitive Advantage As the business environment grew increasingly competitive and connected, and with a blooming management consultancy indus try, Competitive Advantage became a priority for organisations in the 1980’s. Tools like Total Quality Management (TQM), Six Sigma and Lean were used to measure processes and improve productivity. Employees were more involved by collecting data, but ecisions were still made at the top, and goals were used to manage people and maintain control. 1990s: Process Optimisation Benchmarking and business process reengineering became popular in the 1990’s, and by the middle of the decade, 60% of Fortune 500 companies claimed to have plans for or have already initiated such projects. TQM, Six Sigma and Lean remained popular and a more holistic, organisation-wide approach and strategy implementation took the stage with tools such as Strategy Maps and Balance Scorecards. 2000s: Big DataLargely driven by the consulting industry under the banner of Big Data, organisations in the 2000’s started to focus on using technology for growth and value creation. Meanwhile, oversaturati on of existing market space drove to concepts such as Blue Ocean Strategy and Value Innovation. It’s 2013. Globalisation, advances in technology and increased diversity have put organisational challenges into hyper drive. Despite the inspirational stories we read about companies like Zappos, Innocent Drinks and Google, the truth is that most of us are using out-dated management practices and failing to get the most out of our people.Not convinced? Consider this: 65% of people are unhappy at work, only 14% understand their company’s strategy, and 75% are seeking jobs as we speak. Now, what do you think that does for your bottom line? How we lead our people and how we solve problems and innovate, are some of the most important aspects of Management to get right. In our research, we’ve therefore looked specifically at two aspects of Management throughout history, and how these will develop in the future (Figure 1): 1. Management Approach: the style of top managemen t, ranging from: a.Control (i. e. your boss tells you what to do and how to do it). b. Set Goals (i. e. your boss sets goals and expectations, but you have more freedom with regards to how you achieve them). c. Inspire (i. e. your boss gives you scope and freedom to innovate on both the what and the how). 2. Approach to Innovation / Problem Solving: how leaders solve strategic problems and develop new products and services. This ranged from: a. Top Down (i. e. solutions are created and come from the top) b. Top Down with Bottom Up Data (i. e. he rest of the organisation contributes information and experiences, but solutions are still created at the top). c. Participatory (i. e. solutions are created collaboratively, and throughout the organisational levels). After a century of trying to control people, processes and information, we have come to a point in organisational history where we need to recognise that what worked before just simply isn’t enough anymore. Traditional Ma nagement is fine if you want compliance, but if you want innovation and growth, you need to engage your people on a whole new level. Top down control is a thing of the past.Succeeding in today’s environment requires a management style that inspires and is participatory. Over the next couple of weeks I will discuss the future of organisations, and what it really takes to increase value creation, innovation and employee engagement in today’s business environment. : * Planning, organizing, staffing, directing and controlling are functions of -. * - is concerned with policy making while is concerned with implementation of policy. The process of dividing authority and responsibility among executive is called the creation of . * was the founder of scientific management movement. | | Human relations movementElton Mayo, who is considered to be the founder of human relations movement, and his associates, conducted the Hawthorne Studies in the Hawthorne plant of Western Electri c Company, USA during1927-1932. They stated that the employees’ morale had a great influence on productivity and the manager should treat them as social beings instead of economic beings or simply as cogs of a wheel.For solving any management problem, the manager should understand group attitudes and psychology, as employees are members of a group. His approach and theory emphasized the importance of human and social factors and also individual as well as group relationships, while the classical theory of Taylor and Fayol gave importance to job content and management of physical resources. This theory served to focus attention on the social side of the work and man, as opposed to the economical and technical aspects.This theory is also criticized on the ground that there is no direct connection between morale and productivity, hence the research in Hawthorne plant had a management bias, and that the samples were too small. In spite of these criticisms, the contribution of hum an relations remains and are being applied even today by managers. | | MODERN MANAGEMENT APPROACHES| | BEHAVIORAL SCIENCE MOVEMENT:   The behavioral science approach through its research studies of individual behavior and motivation indicated that the elation between morale and productivity was oversimplified and there was no direct or deep connection between morale and productivity. Behavioral science experts made a further refinement of human relations movement and also covered a much wider scope in interpersonal roles and relationships. The behavioral science movement which started after 1940 emphasized the importance of individuals and their interpersonal relationship, psychology of the individuals as related to personal needs and motivation and motivational potential in people.The important contributors to the behavioral science movement are A. Maslow, F. Hertzberg, V. Vroom and D. McGregor. While Maslow developed a need hierarchy to explain human behavior within an organizat ion, Hertzberg and Vroom developed motivational models, which explained the causes of human behavior and motivation in business. Behavioral science movement has drawn heavily on the work of Maslow to explain human behavior and the dynamics of motivation process. McGregor developed his two theories, viz. , Theory X and Y and also explained certain basic assumptions about the human element.The classical theory reflected almost all the aspects of Theory X while the behavioral approach theory of management reflected almost all the aspects of Theory Y. ELEMENTS OF NEO-CLASSICAL THEORIES :  This theory may be stated as follows. It may be noted here that the theories started by Taylor and Fayol are called by some writers as  Classical theories  while the theories sated by the human relations movement and the behavioral science movement are called  neo- Classical theories. Henri Fayol, the father of principles of management, has classified managerial functions as follows: a.Planning , including forecasting, b. Organizing c. Commanding d. Coordinating, and e. Controlling. A brief description of the various functions of management is given in the next unit. | | LET US SUM UP| | In this unit we have learnt about the meaning and importance of management and its various implementations in different fields. Concept of management has become universal and no organization can survive without it. Management consists of getting things done through others by directing their efforts in an integrated and coordinated manner for achievement of business objectives.It is a process consisting of  Ã‚   functions such as planning, organizing, actuating and controlling the business operations in such a manner as to attain predetermined goals. The evolution of management thought can be classified into three stages, viz, (i) pre-scientific management period, (ii) early management approaches represented by scientific management, process management and human relation management and (i ii) modern management approaches represented by behavioral science movement, quantitative approach, social system approaches etc. Each of these approaches has made a distinctive contribution to management theory. |