Relevance of Hierarchy in Management - Example

Relevance of hierarchy in management Student’s Name: Instructor’s Name: Course Code: Date of Submission: Introduction Hierarchy is the organizational structure in which the organization management is ranked according to its importance and level of management. In the topmost management we have the chief executive officer of the firm, the managers of various functional units like the human resource department, accounts department and marketing department and then we have the supervisors who are directly in control of the employees and finally at the lowest rank there are the employees. In the modern business world, hierarchy has been given a major concern by many organizations because it helps to make management easy and effective. Hierarchy of authority in any organization is of great importance because it benefits both the employees and the organization at large. It helps the organization to grow faster because each rank of management comprises of competent staff which is supposed to provide guidelines for the lower rank management (Hales 2002). This is because before someone is promoted he or she must be competent in order to be considered for promotion. In this regard, hierarchy helps organizations to better manage their functions as each authority has its obligations which they are answerable to. Therefore, hierarchy is of great relevance to the management of businesses today. However there are those scholars who belief that hierarchy is of no relevance in the management of organizations with one of the reasons being that it promotes discrimination. In this paper, it shall discuss that hierarchy is of great relevance in the management of organizations and give a summary of the findings from the research. Relevance of hierarchy in management Hierarchy is important in the management of organizations because it promotes transparency and accountability. Before any employee is promoted to a higher rank, he or she must prove to be competent in the area of specialization (Anderson 7 Media 2012). When there is a clear hierarchy in the organization, everybody is made responsible for any wrong doings that happens at his or her management level. Therefore, every level of management become more careful to ensure minimal or no faults thus promoting transparency unlike organizations which practice flattened structure. For instance, if the purchasing department constantly reports faults in the procurement functions, it should report the matter to the procurement manager who then reports the matter to the operations manager and the issue is followed up to know who is responsible for the defaults thus hierarchy promotes transparency. For instance, Billabong clothing company applies the hierarchy management practice in the management of the organization and it has helped the company to improve its competitiveness in the textile industry and maintain its market share. Hierarchy acts as a guide to the development of skills of employees. The development of employees is done at all levels of management. The employees give their views to the managers who then pass that information to the executive management who then link up with the owners of the company to design programs for developing the skills of the employees (Diefenbach & Sillience 2011). Hierarchy helps the employees to understand and know where they are supposed to give complains to and who will help them. Unlike flattened organization structure, hierarchy guides employees which minimizes confusion in the organization and promotes guidance of employees to the authority which will address their demands. Hierarchy plays a great role in the management of the organization as it provides a clear career path. It defines the various positions in the organization like the executive position, managerial positions and the supervisory positions (Hodgson 2004). These career paths help employees to determine what career they would like to take starting from the supervisory position, managerial position and the executive position. This career path can be used by the top management to motivate the employees by rewarding those who perform better by promoting them. In this manner, the employees will increase their competency by offering their best skills which also improve the performance of the organization. For instance, if a supervisor is promoted to managerial position, he or she will be more motivated and would like to improve the performance to prove that he or she actually has the skills to head the department. Furthermore, through proving the skills he or she could first to be considered for further promotions and this will encourage the employee to work even harder. Good evidence in this scenario is Boag’s brewery which has managed to motivate the employees through the clear path for promotions. In this organization, promotions are based on the merit of the employee and have set clear guidelines for such promotions motivate employees and that is why the company has managed to compete effectively in the market thus hierarchy of relevance in the management of organizations. Hierarchy in an organization helps the management to improve its communication within the organization. Hierarchy provides a clear path for communication between the employees, departments and the top management (Anderson & Media 2012). For instance, each head of the department is the administrator of the particular department and reports to the manager on any issues concerning the department. The manager can then act upon the report or the issues of the department. In this sense, the manager acts better to provide a solution to the issue being communicated than when the employees try to communicate an issue within them. Communication can also be made downward from the executive to the managers and then to the supervisors and this channel ensures the message reaches the employees at the right time without distortion. The manager will aim at improving the communication because he or she understands that one of his responsibilities is to improve communication within the organization. Therefore, hierarchy system in an organization plays a great role in the management because it helps to improve the communication channels in the organization. Hierarchy structure in an organization helps the organization to control and management function to be easy. Organizations which have the structure of hierarchy are more successful than those which use the flattened structure (McSweeney 2006). This is because there is a clear chain of command in the organization which improves the efficiency in management. Hierarchy structure clearly defines each employee is answerable to who and this reduces the blame game as to who was responsible for what. In this effect each employee is accountable and answerable to his or her immediate boss and hence hierarchy helps to manage the organization effectively. Hierarchy structure further helps organizations to delegate responsibilities effectively. The duties are shared effectively within each level of management. For instance, the top management design policies and pass them to the middle level management whose responsibility is to implement the policies. The middle level management then delegates the responsibilities to the supervisors to implement who finally delegate the duties to the employees. Effective delegation of authority ensures effective implementation of the policies because each management level is held accountable of its duties. In this regard, it can be concluded that hierarchy helps to improve the management concepts in organizations through effective delegation of authority. Hierarchy in organizations promotes departmental loyalty and teamwork in organizations. Employees of the same level of management who share same common objectives or goals work together for a long time and they develop passion for their work (Anderson & Media 2012). They form strong bonds within them and develop teamwork spirit which improves their morale at work. High morale among the members of the same level of management requires less supervision thus the management of the organization finds easy time in their management roles because the employees work with less supervision and therefore hierarchy helps in the management concept. Hierarchy in Amcor packaging company helped the organization to grow faster because it improved the management thus resources were used effectively and the employees skills were developed through teamwork which improved the performance of the organization leading to its rapid expansion. Furthermore, hierarchy in organizations motivates the employees. Hierarchy provides clear authorities and responsibilities which employees should follow and these guidelines are not discriminative. These authority guidelines also provide equal opportunities for promotional opportunities and this promotes motivation of employees in their work places (Brown et al 2010). The benefits of motivated employees include improved performance and working with less supervision. This improves the performance of the organization through increased output as well as quality of the products. This helps the management of the organization to find easy time in designing the strategies for excelling in the market by creating competitive advantage. Therefore hierarchy enables the management of an organization to achieve competitive advantage through quality and quantity of products being manufactured as a result of motivated employees. For instance the Bakers delight organization initially had the conflicting roles among employees but since it started to practice hierarchy in the management there are no discriminations thus motivates employees to improve their productivity. Hierarchy in the management concept in the modern business helps the management to plan better for the strategic goals of the organization (Brown et al 2010). This is in the sense that when the strategic plans are implemented effectively by the hierarchy authority the top management will be able to know what strategies they can design so as to implement the objectives of the organization effectively. Hierarchy ensures that everyone is involved in the operations of the organization and if there is any idle department or employees, the management comes up strategic plans to ensure everyone in the organization is actively involved thus hierarchy helps the management to come up strategic plans which will involve every employee in the organization to minimize idleness. Hierarchy in the organization structure helps the employees to understand their roles and the position they are in. In this regard, they will avoid conflicting in roles and their responsibilities which makes it easier for management to control them. Unlike flattened organizations, hierarchy in organization helps to define roles of each employee and in any case there is misunderstanding among the employees of the same level of management they know who their boss is and report the matter. In this case, management is easier thus hierarchy is of great relevance in the management of organizations today. However, on the other hand, there are those scholars who argue that hierarchy is of no relevance in the management of organizations today. In this case the argument is that hierarchy in organizations can lead to communication barriers (Anderson & Media 2012). This is because an organization that practices hierarchy, communication is vertical which limits inter-agency and interdepartmental communication. The departments which are on the same level find it difficult to share information and communicate because they are all on the same level of management thus and the communication cannot be directed from one department to the other. In this scenarios hierarchy in the management of organizations leads to proper communication breakdown between departments of the same level which leads to difficulty in management thus it is of no relevance in the management of organizations today. Furthermore, hierarchy is no relevance in the management of organizations today because it promotes disunity in the organizations. Organizations which practice hierarchy in the management find it hard to harmonize the functions of different departments. In most cases you find that each level of management or department is more concerned on the decisions that will benefit the particular department forgetting the objectives of the organization. In this regard, the management of the organization finds it difficult in harmonizing the departmental decisions with the objectives of the organizations and other departments therefore hierarchy is of no relevance in the management of organizations today. Conclusion Hierarchy in management of businesses today is of great importance as it helps management to find easy time in managing the firm. Many organizations are adopting the concept of hierarchy in their management because it provides clear guidelines to each position in the organization and helps all employees to know who is under whose authority. Hierarchy helps to motivate employees through setting clear guidelines for promotional opportunities without discrimination. It improves communication in the organization by designing clear channels of communication, helps to delegate responsibilities clearly, helps the top management to control the organization easily, helps to develop teamwork spirit and finally hierarchy helps to motivate employees and increase their productivity with less supervision (Hodgson 2004). Therefore according to this paper hierarchy is of great relevance in the management of organizations today. References Anderson, A & Media, D 2012, Why Is the Hierarchy of Authority Important in an Organization? Retrieved on 27may 2013 at http://smallbusiness.chron.com/hierarchy-authority-important-organization-11899.html Brown, A. Kornberger, M. Clegg, S & Carter, C 2010, ‘’Invisible walls’ and ‘silent Hierarchies’: A case study of power relations in an architecture firm, Human Relations Vol. 63, No. 4, pp. 525-549 Diefenbach, T & Sillince, J 2011, ‘Formal and Informal Hierarchy in Different Types Of Organization’ Organization Studies vol. 32, No. 11, pp. 1515-1537. Hales, C 2002, ‘‘Bureaucracy-lite’ and Continuities in Managerial Work’ British Journal Of Management Vol. 13, No. 1, pp. 51-66. Hodgson, D 2004, ‘Project Work: The legacy of bureaucratic control in the post-bureaucratic organization’, Organization, Vol. 11, No. 1, pp. 81-100 McSweeney, B 2006, ‘Are we living in a post-bureaucratic epoh?’ Journal of Organizational Change Management Vol. 19, No. 1, pp. 22-37. Read More