Essentials Management of an Organisation - Scholarship Essay Example

Introduction: The wise saying goes, “We must remember that one determined person can make a significant difference, and that a small group of determined people can change the course of history.”(Sonia Johnson….) The very name Essentials Management implies the absence of non-essentials. Take the example of a sculptor chiseling a statue from a stone block. What does he actually do? He carves out the non-essentials from the stone and the statue emerges. He comprehends fully what is to be removed and what is to be retained, and proceeds with his work systematically. The Essentials Management is all about finding solutions to help the organisation to improve efficiency, reduce costs, decrease cycle time and push up strategic initiatives. What are the issues before an ambitious management and an expanding organization? Find solutions to short term and long term problems, lookout and seize the opportunities well in time in this fast moving age of industrial and internet revolution, tackle critical issues posed from time to time and improve effectiveness in functions and crucial programs. Of the four important factors of production, land, labor, capital and organisation, labor (workforce at all levels) is important. The employees can build an organisation just as sometimes it is claimed that the employees can break it. For the organisation to become prosperous and grow employees (including officials of the top management) need to be basically sound and industrious and basic conditions and favourable atmosphere need to be created for them to become basically sound and industrious. Have a will to grow and grow you will! “If everything is important, then nothing is….Whether it is a multinational corporation, a department within a larger company, or a small entrepreneurial venture, every organisation provides its leader with more distractions and concerns than one person can handle. The key to managing this challenge, of course, is to identify a reasonable number of issues that will have the greater possible impact on the success of your organization, and then spend most your time thinking about, talking about, and working on those issues.”(Lencioni, 2006, introduction. xi) The phrases like decentralization, delegate responsibility etc. often find favor in an expanding organisation. The modern management science favours these techniques. But the critical point for the success of organization is somewhere else. The growth of an organization needs to be a healthy growth. None but the head of an organisation can make it healthy. To delegate responsibility for strategy, technology, finance or marketing is one aspect of management. But the cultural well-being of an organization is the sole responsibility of the core management. It could be just one inspiring individual, or a very small number, but certainly not a group or a big team. The science of ergonomics-finding proper individuals for the proper responsibility: Bifurcate management science into any number of departments, like Personnel Management, Materials Management, Human Resources Management etc. Ultimately, the issue veers round to finding proper men for the proper job! What one does is no doubt important; but how one does, what one does, is more important! Is the performance and results achieved by an executive to whom you have delegated powers, contributes to the organizational health? This aspect is “often neglected because it involves facing realities of human behavior that even the most committed executive is tempted to avoid. It requires levels of discipline and courage that only a truly extraordinary executive is willing to embrace.”(Lencioni, xvi) Groups and teams have the limited role at the implementation level in an organization. They have also limited creative freedom. They are supposed to do whatever is told to them. Decision making can not be their domain for valid reasons. The groups do not have access to the important developments that take place in the competitive world. “The result of increasingly global markets is that risk may originate with events thousands of miles away that have nothing to do with the domestic market. Information is available instantaneously, which means that change, and subsequent reactions, occur very quickly.”(Horcher, 2005. p.1) So, the decision-making group, should comprise of the right mix of skills and their level of understanding and willingness to co-operate with each other, needs to be perfect. Business strategies vs. the intrinsic strength of a healthy group of top management: Let us assume, not much of difference exists between the business strategies of two organisations. In marketing, advertising, promotional activities, seemingly in every secular segment, they score equal. Yet, analysts see one of them prospers and the other falters and faces constant troubles and moves towards the downward spiral. What is the mystery behind the roaring success of an organization? What are the areas where two organisations differ? In a small managing group with right mix of skills and where people were wiling to co-operate with each other, by listening and appreciating the viewpoints, the end-results are precedent-shattering. In one such study between the two competing organisations in similar trade, a consultant remarked, “Something about the Company A (the successful one) is remarkable, like none I’ve ever seen. Their ability to attract clients and employees, to retain clients and employees, and even to maintain a loyal base of former clients and employees is really very impressive.”(Lencioni, p.6) It is possible for a small set of co-operative top executives to take comprehensive, creative and unique approaches to increase the business. Essentials Management will identify the right process, people and technology and that will be done well in time, to felicitate long-term solutions. What is the result when the members of the small group co-operate with each other? In comparing the two companies mentioned above, the consultant further observes “Apparently, there is almost no politics, very little voluntary turnover, and relatively few lawsuits brought by disgruntled employees. Even most of the former employees I spoke to raved about the firm’s culture” (Lencioni, p.7). It is therefore, easy for a small, co-operative team to synchronize and lead the teams formed to develop and implement procedures, policies and timelines for the intended programmes and projects. Creative leadership: In Essentials Management, creative leadership plays the dominant role, and it can work well when a small, capable group discusses the issues and takes decisions. Innovation and original ideas can be quickly translated into action, and implemented when a small group takes decisions. Skill mix has always been a feature of good management system. “ The problem for 'skill mix' as a label is that it has become associated with the need to reduce spending on staff and enforced economies of skills, rather than a planned approach to genuinely mixed teams.”(Hindu, 2008) Right mix of skills, attitude is important in a large-scale organisation. The decision making body, in such an organisation needs to be small and compact. “Most of the sociologists and psychologists insistently warn us of its (trend towards vastness of the organization) inherent dangers—dangers to the integrity of the individual when he feels as nothing more than a small cog in a vast machine and when the human relationships of his daily working life become increasingly dehumanized; dangers also to efficiency and productivity, stemming from ever-growing Parkinsonian bureaucracies.” (Schumacher, 1977, p. 225) Where the emphasis in a large organization is on the hype and myths about the nature of groups and teams, “it goes through alternating phases of centralising and decentralising, like the swings of a pendulum. Whenever one encounters such opposites, each of them with persuasive arguments in is favour it is worth looking in to the depth of the problem for something more than compromising more than half-and-half solutions. Maybe what we really need is not either-or but the-one-and-the-other-at-the-same-time.”(Schumacher, p.226-227) Right mix of skills and cooperation within the group, is the necessity of the present of times. An organisation prospers with the clarity of purpose and orderliness. When things fall into disorder, nothing can be accomplished. More the groups and teams, more confusion and delay in decisions are likely. Orderliness again is a flexible concept. In this fast-moving internet age, orderliness is likely to become static and lifeless, if timely changes are not made. A great organisation is the one, which does things that have never been done before, never attempted and accomplished before. The creative ideas of the members with right mix skills anticipate the desired developments and takes right steps at the right time. When we stress the advantage of the right mix of skills and all the members of the group co-operating with each other, one should remember that the real freedom and entrepreneurship can exist only with one authority. In such an organisation “the structure of the organisation can then be symbolised by a man holding a large number of balloons in his hand. Each of the balloons has its own buoyancy and lift, and the man himself does not lord it over the balloons, but stands beneath them, yet holding all the strings firmly in his hand.”(Schumacher, p.229) Conclusion: Any blueprint for an organisation can not become the permanent one. It requires constant modifying as per the demand of the business environment. Skill and co-operation lies in quickly understanding the changing scenario and enforce the necessary changes with speed and accuracy. Those who control the core set of activities need to have perfect understanding and good work culture, and willingness to trust each other in the interest of the organisation. They must connect well, without confusion. It is not easy to achieve success but it is even tougher to maintain the success level achieved. The Essentials Management is to keep the level of expertise in an organization perfect at all times, at all costs and in all the situations. ************* Works Cited: Hindu, Online edition of India's National Newspaper, May 26, 2008 Horcher, Karen A. Essentials of Financial Risk Management (Essentials Series). Wiley: 2005 Lencioni, Patrick. The Four Obsessions of an Extraordinary Executive; Jossey-Bass, 2006 Schumacher, E.F. Small is beautiful; Radha Krishna, Delhi, 1977 Read More