ACCOUNTING AND BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION
MANAGERS AND MANAGING (Ch. 1)
What is management:
- Organizations, all managers work in organizations, that are collections of people who work
together and coordinate their actions to achieve goals
- Managers are the people responsible for supervising the use of an organization’s resources
to meet its goal
- Resources such as people and their skills, know-how and experience, raw materials,
machinery, computers and technology, patents, financial capital, customers and employees
- Management includes the planning, organizing, leading and controlling of human and other
resources to achieve organizational goals effectively and efficiently
Manager’s goal is to achieve high performance, and organizational performance is a measure of
how efficiently and effectively managers use available resources to satisfy customers and achieve
organizational goals.
Efficiency is a measure of how well or how productively resources are used to achieve a goal,
effectiveness is a measure of the appropriateness of the goals an organization is pursuing and the
degree to which the organization achieves those goals.
Four tasks of management:
- Planning, choose appropriate organizational goals and courses of action to best achieve
those goals, deciding how to allocate organizational resources and what strategies to adopt.
How well managers plan and develop strategies determines how effective and efficient the
organization is.
- Organizing, is structuring working relationships so organizational members interact and
cooperate to achieve organizational goals. Organizing people into departments according to
the kinds of job-specific tasks they perform lays out the lines of authority and responsibility
between different individuals and groups. Managers must decide how best to organize
resources, particularly human resources. The outcome of organizing is the creation of an
organizational structure, a formal system of task and reporting relationships that coordinates
and motivates members so they work together to achieve organizational goals.
- Leading, managers articulate a clear organizational vision for the organization’s members to
accomplish, and they energize and enable employees so everyone understands the part he
plays in achieving organizational goals. Leadership involves managers using their power,
1
, personality, influence, persuasion, and communication skills to coordinate people and
groups so their activities and efforts are in harmony.
- Controlling, the task of managers is to evaluate how well an organization has achieved its
goal and to take any corrective actions needed to maintain or improve performance. The
outcome of the controlling process is the ability to measure performance accurately and
regulate organizational efficiency and effectiveness. The controlling task also helps
managers evaluate how well they are performing the other three tasks of management, and
take corrective action.
Managerial roles:
Henry Mintzberg identified 10 managerial roles divided in three different groups
TYPE OF ROLE SPECIFIC ROLE ROLE ACTIVITIES
Outline future organizational goals to employees
at company meetings; open a new corporate
Figura di spicco
headquarters building; state the organization’s
FIGUREHEAD
ethical guidelines and the principles of behavior
employees have to follow in their dealings with
customers and suppliers.
Provide an example for employees to follow;
INTERPERSONAL
give direct commands and orders to subordinate;
LEADER
make decisions concerning the use of human and
technical resources.
Coordinate the work of managers in different
Intermediario
departments; establish alliances between
LIAISON
different organizations to share resources to
produce new goods and services.
Evaluate the performance of managers in
different tasks, and take corrective action to
INFORMATIONAL improve their performance; watch for changes
MONITOR
occurring in the external and internal
environments that may affect the organization in
the future.
2
, Inform employees about changes taking place in
Divulgatore the external and internal environments that will
DISSEMINATOR affect them and the organization; communicate
to employees the organization’s vision and
INFORMATIONAL purpose.
Launch a national advertising campaign to
portavoce
promote new goods and services; give a speech
SPOKESPERSON
to inform the local community about the
organization’s future intentions.
Commit organizational resources to develop
Imprenditore
innovative goods and services; decide to expand
ENTREPENEUR
internationally to obtain new customers for the
organization’s products.
Move quickly to take corrective action to deal
with unexpected problems facing the
DISTURBANCE organization from the external environment,
HANDLER such as a crisis like an oil spill, or from the
DECISIONAL internal environment, such as producing faulty
goods or services.
Allocate organizational resources among
RESOURCE different tasks and departments of the
ALLOCATOR organization; set budgets and salaries of middle
and first-level managers.
Work with suppliers, distributors, and labor
NEGOTIATOR unions to reach agreements about the quality and
price of input, technical, and human resources.
Levels of managers
To perform the four managerial tasks efficiently and effectively, organizations group or
differentiate their managers in two main ways, by level in hierarchy and by type of skill.
First, they differentiate managers according to three level in the organization’s hierarchy of
authority:
3
, - CEO (top managers) (CEO, CMO, CIO etc.) they establish organizational goals, decide
how different departments should interact and monitor how well middle managers use the
resources. They spend most of their time planning organizational goals and organizing the
structure, but also, they are responsible for the most of the controlling task.
- Middle managers, supervise first-line managers, they are responsible for finding the best
way to use resources to achieve organizational goals and also to pass the information from
the top to the bottom of the structure.
- First-line managers, often called supervisors, are responsible for the daily supervision of
the nonmanagerial employees, they have a lot of interpersonal relationships, and an
important leading role over the employees.
Secondly, organizations group managers into different departments according to their specific skills
and experience. A department is a group of managers and employees who work together because
they possess similar skills and knowledge.
Managerial skills
Both education and experience enable managers to recognize and develop the personal skills they
need to put organizational resources to their best use. Research has shown that education and
experience help managers acquire and develop three types of skills:
- Conceptual skills, it’s the ability to analyze and diagnose a situation and distinguish
between cause and effect, top managers require the best conceptual skills because their
primary responsibilities are planning and organizing.
- Human skills, it’s the ability to understand, lead and control the behavior of other
plasmare
individuals and groups. The ability to communicate, coordinate, motivate and to mold
individuals into a cohesive team, distinguishes effective from ineffective managers. Skills
like these are especially significant for successful management in the public sector.
- Technical skills, are job-specific skills required to perform a particular type of work or
occupation at a high level. Managers need a range of technical skills to be effective. The
insieme
array of technical skills managers need depends on their position on their organizations.
Core competency is the specific set of departmental skills, abilities, knowledge and experience that
allows one organization to outperform its competitors. In other words, are the skills that allow an
organization to reach a competitive advantage, which is the difference between the price of a good
and cost of it.
4
MANAGERS AND MANAGING (Ch. 1)
What is management:
- Organizations, all managers work in organizations, that are collections of people who work
together and coordinate their actions to achieve goals
- Managers are the people responsible for supervising the use of an organization’s resources
to meet its goal
- Resources such as people and their skills, know-how and experience, raw materials,
machinery, computers and technology, patents, financial capital, customers and employees
- Management includes the planning, organizing, leading and controlling of human and other
resources to achieve organizational goals effectively and efficiently
Manager’s goal is to achieve high performance, and organizational performance is a measure of
how efficiently and effectively managers use available resources to satisfy customers and achieve
organizational goals.
Efficiency is a measure of how well or how productively resources are used to achieve a goal,
effectiveness is a measure of the appropriateness of the goals an organization is pursuing and the
degree to which the organization achieves those goals.
Four tasks of management:
- Planning, choose appropriate organizational goals and courses of action to best achieve
those goals, deciding how to allocate organizational resources and what strategies to adopt.
How well managers plan and develop strategies determines how effective and efficient the
organization is.
- Organizing, is structuring working relationships so organizational members interact and
cooperate to achieve organizational goals. Organizing people into departments according to
the kinds of job-specific tasks they perform lays out the lines of authority and responsibility
between different individuals and groups. Managers must decide how best to organize
resources, particularly human resources. The outcome of organizing is the creation of an
organizational structure, a formal system of task and reporting relationships that coordinates
and motivates members so they work together to achieve organizational goals.
- Leading, managers articulate a clear organizational vision for the organization’s members to
accomplish, and they energize and enable employees so everyone understands the part he
plays in achieving organizational goals. Leadership involves managers using their power,
1
, personality, influence, persuasion, and communication skills to coordinate people and
groups so their activities and efforts are in harmony.
- Controlling, the task of managers is to evaluate how well an organization has achieved its
goal and to take any corrective actions needed to maintain or improve performance. The
outcome of the controlling process is the ability to measure performance accurately and
regulate organizational efficiency and effectiveness. The controlling task also helps
managers evaluate how well they are performing the other three tasks of management, and
take corrective action.
Managerial roles:
Henry Mintzberg identified 10 managerial roles divided in three different groups
TYPE OF ROLE SPECIFIC ROLE ROLE ACTIVITIES
Outline future organizational goals to employees
at company meetings; open a new corporate
Figura di spicco
headquarters building; state the organization’s
FIGUREHEAD
ethical guidelines and the principles of behavior
employees have to follow in their dealings with
customers and suppliers.
Provide an example for employees to follow;
INTERPERSONAL
give direct commands and orders to subordinate;
LEADER
make decisions concerning the use of human and
technical resources.
Coordinate the work of managers in different
Intermediario
departments; establish alliances between
LIAISON
different organizations to share resources to
produce new goods and services.
Evaluate the performance of managers in
different tasks, and take corrective action to
INFORMATIONAL improve their performance; watch for changes
MONITOR
occurring in the external and internal
environments that may affect the organization in
the future.
2
, Inform employees about changes taking place in
Divulgatore the external and internal environments that will
DISSEMINATOR affect them and the organization; communicate
to employees the organization’s vision and
INFORMATIONAL purpose.
Launch a national advertising campaign to
portavoce
promote new goods and services; give a speech
SPOKESPERSON
to inform the local community about the
organization’s future intentions.
Commit organizational resources to develop
Imprenditore
innovative goods and services; decide to expand
ENTREPENEUR
internationally to obtain new customers for the
organization’s products.
Move quickly to take corrective action to deal
with unexpected problems facing the
DISTURBANCE organization from the external environment,
HANDLER such as a crisis like an oil spill, or from the
DECISIONAL internal environment, such as producing faulty
goods or services.
Allocate organizational resources among
RESOURCE different tasks and departments of the
ALLOCATOR organization; set budgets and salaries of middle
and first-level managers.
Work with suppliers, distributors, and labor
NEGOTIATOR unions to reach agreements about the quality and
price of input, technical, and human resources.
Levels of managers
To perform the four managerial tasks efficiently and effectively, organizations group or
differentiate their managers in two main ways, by level in hierarchy and by type of skill.
First, they differentiate managers according to three level in the organization’s hierarchy of
authority:
3
, - CEO (top managers) (CEO, CMO, CIO etc.) they establish organizational goals, decide
how different departments should interact and monitor how well middle managers use the
resources. They spend most of their time planning organizational goals and organizing the
structure, but also, they are responsible for the most of the controlling task.
- Middle managers, supervise first-line managers, they are responsible for finding the best
way to use resources to achieve organizational goals and also to pass the information from
the top to the bottom of the structure.
- First-line managers, often called supervisors, are responsible for the daily supervision of
the nonmanagerial employees, they have a lot of interpersonal relationships, and an
important leading role over the employees.
Secondly, organizations group managers into different departments according to their specific skills
and experience. A department is a group of managers and employees who work together because
they possess similar skills and knowledge.
Managerial skills
Both education and experience enable managers to recognize and develop the personal skills they
need to put organizational resources to their best use. Research has shown that education and
experience help managers acquire and develop three types of skills:
- Conceptual skills, it’s the ability to analyze and diagnose a situation and distinguish
between cause and effect, top managers require the best conceptual skills because their
primary responsibilities are planning and organizing.
- Human skills, it’s the ability to understand, lead and control the behavior of other
plasmare
individuals and groups. The ability to communicate, coordinate, motivate and to mold
individuals into a cohesive team, distinguishes effective from ineffective managers. Skills
like these are especially significant for successful management in the public sector.
- Technical skills, are job-specific skills required to perform a particular type of work or
occupation at a high level. Managers need a range of technical skills to be effective. The
insieme
array of technical skills managers need depends on their position on their organizations.
Core competency is the specific set of departmental skills, abilities, knowledge and experience that
allows one organization to outperform its competitors. In other words, are the skills that allow an
organization to reach a competitive advantage, which is the difference between the price of a good
and cost of it.
4
