The Idea of the Management Functions - Term Paper Example

Name Course Tutor Date Leadership and Management in Action Introduction The ever expanding business opportunities and competitions have resulted in many transformations in the way organisational activities are operated, not withstanding the idea that the management functions deeply affect the outcomes of the business in terms of goal achievement, organisational overall performance as well as its competitive advantage. Management functions The management functions including planning, leading, organising and controlling are theories that were brought in to limelight by Henry Fayol (1841-1925) to guide managers on their responsibilities within the management, in order to direct the organisation towards success. The human resource department within a hotel widely applies these functions for the departments, hence organisational success. (A) Management functions in a hotel’s human resource department. Planning This function entails setting objectives and providing a method for achieving them. The hotel’s Human resource managers should know the environmental circumstances their organisation is facing in relation to labour and predict the upcoming circumstances, which require good decision making skills. Planning is a series of steps right from environmental scanning (economic conditions, competitors and customers) to foretelling the expected future circumstances. Establishing objectives within the hotel’s department is relevant since they are what the organisation aims at achieving within a given period of time including attracting potential employees, recruiting employees for the understaffed departments, providing incentives for retaining employees, developing competitive personnel as well as providing employees with appropriate health care. The organisation proposes various actions to be undertaken in order to achieve the objectives, from which they select the best and appropriate action for the objectives. The human resource department needs to form appropriate steps and ensure successful plan implementation as well as constant review and evaluation of the plan’s success while implementing corrections when necessary (Gold,19). Organising This is the next step taken after planning and involves getting prepared, organised and putting the plan in to action as well as establishing an authority structure for all duties. This process ensures there are adequate resources for achieving the organisation’s goals. The human resource manager has to ensure adequate allocation of human resources to achieve the goals of the hotel. The human resource manager also organizes the human resources by ensuring hiring, training and deploying the appropriate workforce and ensuring availability of appropriate skills for the hotel. Therefore organizing employees in terms of the hotel’s demands and how they are to serve is a fundamental role of the human resource manager (Morgan, 127). Leading After organising, leading is the third step and it involves influencing others so as to achieve the goals of the organisation through making wise decision together with issuing orders as well as directives. The hotel’s human resource manager ensures supervision and control of the staff’s actions through establishing authority in every level and department, so that the staff can be able to effectively enhance realization of the hotel’s goals while at the same time motivating the workers using prize and incentive programs according to the job performance. This is focussed on the course of the requirements of employees in order to attain a productive and positive working environment, apart from enhancing interpersonal relationships (Robbins, 280). Controlling This function involves developing the performance standards based on the objectives of the organisation, which implies that performance should be in accordance with the expected standards. The hotel’s human resource manager needs to establish the standards for performance compare the employee performance with the set standards and take the corrective measures when it is needed in order to ensure that all activities that are related to subordinate working are in line with and enhancing the achievement of the departmental and the hotel’s objectives. The manager should also be able to address the problems facing employees in every department of the hotel (Arthur, 12). (b) Comparison and contrast of the functions at different managerial levels There are three levels of management including the top (e.g. chief executive officers and presidents), middle (e.g. general and regional managers) and first (e.g. general and regional managers) levels, ranked according to importance, the manager numbers at every level resembles the pyramid, with most managers at the first level and fewest at the top level. Top-level managers The top level managers in the hotel perform the planning, organizing and the controlling functions more than any other managers within the levels of management. In as much as they are given this credit, they actually perform less leading as compared to the rest of the management levels. The planning, organizing as well as controlling responsibilities reduces down the management levels with the top-level managers making decisions which influence the whole hotel. They don’t perform the function of directing the daily activities of the hotel but rather set goals and direct the hotel to accomplish them (DuBrin, 120). They are responsible for the overall performance of the hotel and their jobs are always very visible, for instance they address issues like hotel’s outsourcing possibility, its strategic position or its overseas expansion opportunities. They also concentrate on major crises like recalling defective goods and making hefty, general budget decisions while negotiating on greater fundamental issues including labour contracts, mergers and other hotel or company acquisitions (Jones, 176). Middle level managers They are below the top managers and include people promoted from first level management positions or personalities hired outside of the hotel. They include regional managers, general managers, divisional managers and plant managers, people with the responsibilities of executing the goals proposed by the top managers, especially by setting goals for the different hotel units in addition to their departments, hence motivate and assist the first line managers in achieving the hotel’s objectives. They communicate suggestions and feedback information to the top managers, including information which is instrumental in improving the hotel’s bottom line. The middle level managers may be responsible for supervising and managing small or large number of employees, for instance the employees in the whole hotel, they organize specific allocations and work with other managers to help achieve the hotel’s goals. They apply great technical skills in organizing and planning while handling issues of large work units, for instance they may diagnose the reasons for sales drop in a given retail location (Rue,152) First level managers They are also referred to as supervisors or first line managers and include office managers, foreperson and shift supervisor. They do most of the leading considering that leading becomes more with the down ward trend in management hierarchy. They are involved with the hotel’s actual activities therefore they not only evaluate, but direct the line employees apart from preparing budgets and scheduling the employees. They are also responsible for employee performance and motivation (Williams, 109). Exhibit 1: diagram illustrating the degree of function performance in relation to the manager levels. Time spent on Management Function at Different Levels Planning Org Loading Controlling Top Level Mgt Middle level Mgt First Level Mgt (c) Organizational culture and competitive advantage This is a code that is largely subconscious and tacit giving organizational ‘feel’ and determining things that are wrong or right, valuable or useless, workable or unworkable within the organization, and the organizational response to crisis and sudden change. This has great impacts on the productivity of the organization, guides the customer care, ensures product quality and product safety. This also affects punctuality, attendance and environmental concern within the organization which are all vital in enhancing the organization’s competitive advantage. It is mostly presented in form of mission and vision statements. The organization culture is thus important in various ways (McSweeney, 90). It enhances high productivity by eliminating the destructive influence of the hired employees who have not yet developed the set values, commitments as well as the goals of the organization hence may weaken the organizational links and bonds. Since these values entail what is important or not and what is proper or not among the employees, they greatly enhance the employees’ positive behaviour along with motivation to take part and contribute within the organization, which translates in to a greater competitive advantage (Schein, 97). The organization culture also creates an environment that is positive by retaining individuals who have values that reflect the organization values apart from ensuring success and engaging the overall organization in the maintenance of the environment, thereby enabling employees to take pleasure in working in order to help in realization of the company goals, which leads to better performance hence more competitive advantage. Apart from this, the organization’s culture also assists in determining the employees’ rewarding method which is essential in employee motivation, this includes pay, personal growth opportunities, and status (Hofstede (a), 120). It also reflects the decision making criteria and the management accessibility, which all affect the contributions from other employees and the performance of the organization, hence determining the organization’s competitive advantage, with better decisions leading to more competitive advantage. Since it is a culture of the ‘shared meaning’, it is very instrumental in harmonizing the operations of the organization and developing human trust in the organization without which there could be program failures, hence becoming a source of competitive advantage (Hofstede (b), 340). (d) Using Geert Hofstede’s dimensions and national cultures The individualism It is the opposite of collectivism and brings out level of incorporation of people into groups. People from individualism cultures are always not closely tied with every individual taking care of the immediate family and himself or herself. It is crucial for the organization to consider the influence of such employees in the decision making process of the organization. The organization also needs to consider that such employees value personal achievements therefore the organization needs to plan for them. The organization should also consider that the employees from these cultures stress a lot on the individual rights and believe in the value of group work to a given extent, while at the same time emphasizing on individual rights to opinions which might affect the obedience level of the organization. They as well believe in equality in the workplace, a characteristic which implies that managers should avoid favouritism and other biasness. The organization may also consider such employees in terms of their contribution towards achieving the goals of the organization especially since the employees value the organization’s tasks than the relationships within the organization. The American employees are an example of the people from the culture of individualism, especially reflected in the “American dream”, the hope for better living standards and better life quality than that of the parents, which also implies that the individuals can improve and become better hence be alleviated from poverty (Kolman, 80). Uncertainty accepting employees The uncertainty avoidance level reflects the levels of the employee tolerance to the uncertainty, therefore reflects the level to which the employees are comfortable with or without the planned situations. The employees from uncertainty avoidance nations always tend to be emotional and are always stimulated by their internal strengths. However, while dealing with uncertainty accepting employees, as in this case, the organisation needs to consider that the uncertainty accepting employees tolerate more varied opinions away from their usual ones, which they may view as curious or ridiculous while at the same time striving to have very limited rules and regulations. They prefer avoiding works schedules as much as they prefer free working environment. It is good to know that they tend to avoid rules to the possible extent and have relativism on the philosophical side. Such employees are very indifferent, unconcerned and contemplating. Hence their environment doesn’t expect any emotional expressions or responses from them. They also don’t put much emphasis on formalization as well as standardisation hence they are less likely to develop such qualities. It is also important for the organisation to realize that such employees prefer a stress-free environment and tolerate vague objectives (Lamond, 340). Works Cited Hofstede, Geert (b). Cultures and organizations: software of the mind. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2005. McSweeney, Brendan "Hofstede's Model Of National Cultural Differences And Their Consequences: A Triumph Of Faith - A Failure Of Analysis". Human Relations 55 (2002): 89–118. Lamond, David. "A Matter of Style: Reconciling Henri and Henry." Management Decision 42, no. 2 (2004): 330–356. Robbins, Stephen. Management. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1999. Morgan, Gareth. Images of Organization. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, 1997. Schein, Edgar. Organizational Culture and Leadership. New York: John Wiley and Sons, 2004 Arthur, Carmazzi."Lessons from the Monkey King - Leading Change to Create Gorilla Sized Results". Veritas Publishing, 3(2007):10-15 Kolman, Ludek. “Cross-cultural differences in Central Europe”. Journal of Managerial Psychology, Vol. 18 (2000): 76 – 88. Hofstede, Geert (a) .Culture's Consequences: comparing values, behaviours, institutions, and organizations across nations . Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications,2001. Gold, David. Strategic Planning for Human Resource Management. HRMagazine 10 (1992): 5- 11 DuBrin, Andrew J. Essentials of Managemen. Peterborough, Ontario: Thomson South-Western, 2003. Jones, Gareth. Contemporary Management. New York: McGraw-Hill Irwin, 2006. Rue, Leslie W. Management: Skills and Applications. New York: McGraw-Hill Irwin, 2003. Williams, Chuck. Management. Cincinnati, OH: South-Western College Publishing, 2000. Read More