Development of Management Thought Free Essay Example

Management Is a discipline. But management also people. Every achievement of management is the achievement of a manager. Every failure is a failure off manager. People manage rather than ‘forces’ or ‘facts’ . The vision, dedication and integrity of managers determine whether there is a management or mismanagement’ Stewart, R, Management and organizational behavior, Sixth Edition, Laurie J Mullions. Renting Hall (2002) Management takes place within a structured organizational setting with prescribed roles. It is directed towards the achievement of aims and objectives through Influencing the efforts of others.

This role encouraged a lot of writers to study management aspects, where they came out with theories that’s become the sprit of management thinking. Management theories came according to the industrial situation at the time, but a lot of these theories are still relevant till today and most of the manager still believe in it. O In my assignment will give a look at the four mall management approaches and evaluate them then I will give my opinion to which one is still relevant based on my own experience at work.

2-0 Major Management Approaches Studying management started around the end of the nineteenth century , and study was relevant to than one before even by completing it or by view other parts of the organization that the one before didn’t concentrate In It.

So studying these theories Is very important to managers to understand the development of management thinking and to base on it when dealing with different parties of the organization. So in order to help managers these studies categorized as approaches , where there Is four main approaches that Identified the development of management thinking , mom of these approaches are still applied in our daily living where things required managing like business ,military ,religion and political.

The four mall approaches of management thinking are: 2- The Human Relation Approach 3- The system Approach 4- The contingency Approach. To understand these approaches I will discuss each one of these individually and evaluate them. 2-1 The Classical Approach The classical approach was raises after the growth of organizations due where the automation and mass production became the concern of productivity. But management thinking was still slow to evolve during this revelation ago there was a deed to develop a theory of management to provide a tools for managers while dealing with their organizational challenges.

So the need of classical approach arise which encourage Taylor, Payola and Weber. 2-1-1 Frederic Taylor (1856-1915) Taylor is known as the ‘father of scientific management’ Taylor started working from the bottom till he reached the position of chief engineer at a steel company. During this period he experiment the best way of performing each work operation, he sough to establish a clear division of labor between management and employees.

Taylor developed four principles of scientific management: The development of a science for each element of a man’s work to replace the old rule. ; Mangers should assume the responsibility for selecting, training and developing the employee. ; The development of a cooperate spirit between workers and management to ensure that work would be carried in scientific management method. ; Management should share an equal share with workers; each group will take over the work that is fitted to it. Improving work methods, also Taylor suggest that the best way to increase Job performance and productivity to reach financial incentives is by paying employees by he piece through the piece rate system He had a special frame wok of organization: ; Clear authority ; Clear responsibility ; Separation of planning from operations ; Incentive plan for each worker ; Task specialization Strengths of Scientific Management: 1- It helps in measuring the accuracy of tasks and procedures 2- Measuring tasks and process gave useful information that helps in improvements and designing. – Improving task methods will increase productivity. 4- It helps managers to be a leader starting from low level 5- It helps in improving the physical work condition for workers Weaknesses of Scientific Management: 1- It reduce the worker involvement in methods and procedure 2- It gave control and planning at the manager’s level 3- It ignored human aspects of employment and concentrate on financial side as a motivator. 4- Ignoring the employment human needs create a boring Job and reduce their moral. – However Taylor was the first to point that it’s management’s primary responsibility to make and organization productive, and that what make his theory still relevant to today. Henry Payola belongs to the administrative management of classical school, Payola darted as an apprentice to General manager at a mining company, he credited with turning the company around from a threatened bankruptcy into strong financial position. As a result of his experience, Payola believed management theories can be developed and taught to others .

His theory developed at the same time as scientific management, but while Taylor recognized from bottom to up, administrate theory looked at productivity improvement from the top all the way to the bottom his theory analyzed the activates of industrial undertaking into six groups: ; Technical (production, manufacture and adaptation) Commercial (buying, selling) ; Financial (obtaining capital and making use of the funds) ; Security (safeguarding) ; Accounting (information on the economic position, stocktaking) ; Managerial As a result of his long management careers, he believed that management had five principle roles: ; To Forecast and plan was the act of anticipating the future and acting accordingly. ; To organizes the development of the institution’s resources, both material and human. ; To Command by keeping the institution’s actions and processes running. ; To Co-ordinate the alignment and harmonize of the groups’ efforts. To control mean that the above activities were performed in accordance with appropriate rules and procedures. Then he developed fourteen principles of administration to go along with management’s five primary roles.

These principles are 2- Authority and responsibility 3- Discipline 4- Unity of command 5- Unity of direction 6- Subordination of Individual interest to General Interest 7- Remuneration 8- Centralization 9- Scalar chain 10- Order 11- Equity 12- Stability of tenure of personnel 13- Initiative, all levels of staff should be encouraged to show initiative within the limit of authority and discipline. 4- Esprit De corps. Strengths of Administrative theory: 1- Payola was the one who give a definition to management today ‘ management is to forecast and plan, to organize, to command, to coordinate and to control’ 2- A lot of the management terminology that’s used today came was taken from Payola’s principles. Weaknesses of Administrative theory: 1- He was describing the structure of formal organization not the real one. 2- Look at the employee as a machine rather than an important part of the organization.

In general The 14 Payola’s principles are still used in management today also his management 6 roles are still what separate the good manager from the bad one. 2-1-3 Max Weber (1864-1924) Weber was an economist and social historian, he came when environment changed from older emotion and tradition driven values to technological one, He believed that civilization was changing to seek technically optimal results at the expense of emotional or humanistic content. Through analyses of organization Weber identified bureaucracy in organization as a form of certain dominant characteristics such as hierarchy of authority and system Based on this he described authority of three types: Traditional authority: where acceptance and obey come from tradition and custom. Charismatic authority: where acceptance arises from loyalty to, and confidence in. ; Rational-legal authority: where acceptance comes from the office, or position of the person in authority as bounded the rule and procedures of the organization. His main characteristics of Bureaucracy were: ; Hierarchy, All position with a bureaucracy are structured from top to down which provides a clear chain of command throughout the organization. ; Division of labor and specialization, all responsibilities in an organization are allocated as official duties among positions ; Rules and regulations, all organizational activities should have a clear standard. Impersonal relationships between mangers and employees, Weber believes it’s necessary for managers to maintain an impersonal relationship with the employee. ; Competence, Employment, Job assignment and promotions are based on technical qualification. ; Records, he believes it’s important for organization to keep complete files regarding all its activates. Strength of bureaucracy theory: it distributed equally. 2- Bureaucracy helped organization to grow into large complex organized system. – It increase the communication between top management and employee 4- It provides a clear chain of command control and order inside the organization. 5- Provide a rules and regulation to all activates provide certainty and facilitate coordination.

Weakness of bureaucracy theory: 1- Organization will concentrate on procedure rather than goals. 2- Jobholder will lose initiative and flexibility. 3- Position and responsibility may lead to bureaucratic attitude. 4- Impersonal relations can lead to UN responsible employee when incident or problem occur. Weber shares a common ground with Payola’s thinking, like scalar chain, facilitation, authority, are typical bureaucracy also Weeper’s idea of employment and promotion based on technical competence would have a common idea with Taylor scientific management. With all the differences between classical approach theories it draw the picture of the practical manager. But with the concentration at the machines it forgets the human factor. -2 Human Relation Approach The classical theories forget the human factor of the organization this led to a deeper consideration of the employee’s need and the role of management to provide these needs also things like motivations, group work, leadership. The major organizational theory in the human relations movement was Mayo the Hawthorne studies then Neo- Human relation theories came with Abraham Moscow and Douglas McGregor. 2-2-1 Elton Mayo, Hawthorne studies: Hawthorne studies carried out in the Hawthorne plant of the western Electric Company (USA) in 1927-32,these experiments consist of two studies focused on The result of these experiments made it clear that the group dynamic and social makeup of an organization were an extremely force either for or against higher productivity.

This caused the call for greater participation for the workers, greater rust and openness in the working environment and a greater attention to teams and groups in the work place. 2-2-2 Moscow (1943) Abraham Moscow was the first psychologist to develop a theory of motivation based upon a consideration of human needs. Mason’s theory of human needs has three assumptions. First, human needs are never completely satisfied. Second, human behavior is purposeful and is motivated by need satisfaction. Third, needs can be classified according to a hierarchical structure of importance from the lowest to highest. He believes the needs hierarchy can be classified into five specific groups.

To reach successive levels of the hierarchy required the satisfaction of the lower level needs: 1- psychological needs 2- Safety needs 3- Love needs 4- Esteem needs 5- Self Actualization need so managers role is to figure out what stage is subordinate at and try to motivate them to reach the next level. 2-2-3 McGregor (Theory x and Theory y) McGregor believes there are two basic kinds of managers. One type of manager, Theory X, has a negative view of employees assuming they are lazy, untrustworthy and incapable of assuming responsibility while the other type of Manager, Theory Y, assumes employees are trustworthy and capable of assuming responsibility having high levels of motivation.

McGregor Theory X and Y is appealing to managers and dramatically demonstrate the divergence in management viewpoints toward employees. As such, Theory X and Y has been extremely helpful in promoting management understanding of supervisory styles and employee motivational assumptions. 2-2-4 Herbage’s motivation hygiene theory: Herbert later extended the approach with an expansion of two-factor theory. He asserted that Job satisfaction and dissatisfaction are affected by the way workers feel The research showed that the work itself and achievement as well as recognition for the achievement are the primary motivators. Herbert terms these factors satisfiers or motivators.

Factors having a negative motivation impact on the research subjects are the working conditions, salary, Job security, supervisory methods and the general company management climate. Herbert terms these factors hygiene factors or dissatisfies. The difference between motivators and hygiene factors is that motivators cause an employee to develop his/her own internal motivations, whereas hygiene factors can cake an employee unhappy and dissatisfied, but cannot motivate him/her. The Job itself is the motivator. Strength of Human relation approach 1- It concentrates at the employee’s need and look at them as an important factor of the organization not as a machine. – It increase the communication between top management and employee 3- It looks at involving employee in decision making as a way of motivation. 4- It makes organization as an open and trusting environment. 5- It emphasized on group rather than individuals. Weaknesses of human relation approach: 1- It concentrates on human factor and ignored the organization production. – It gives employee more power, which can be sometimes stronger than the management. 3- Looking at the human vector is a narrow view, which affects the organization goal. 2-3 Systems Approach This approach views work in an interdisciplinary manner. It stems from the belief that all organizations operate as systems and as parts of an even greater system.

Managers need to take into account organizational behavior and factors and their effects on the systems as well as outside influences on the organization organization, such as: ; Physical environment ; Social environment ; Information environment Political environment ; Moral environment ; Technological environment Strength of system approach 1- The system thinking is different of the traditional approach that looks only into task and structure and the human approach which concentrate on human factor, system approach look at organization as whole. 2- The system approach looks at the organization as an open system, which interact with the environment.