The Implication of Management Theory to Todays Administrative Function

1. The Implication of Management Theory to this days’ administrative function. The implication of management theory to this day’s administrative function is to improve quality of productivity, better working environment and decrease loss. The means may vary from era to another era but at the long run its goal is similar. Classical Era

It focuses on the efficiency of the work process. It has three schools of thinking: Scientific management, which looks at ‘the best way’ to do a job; Bureaucratic management, which focuses on rules and procedures, hierarchy and clear division of labor; and Administrative management, which emphasizes the flow of information within the organization. From Scientific management it thought today’s administrative function by:

• Developing new standard methods for doing each job

• Selecting, training, and developing workers instead of allowing them to choose their own tasks and train themselves

• Developing a spirit of cooperation between workers and management to ensure that work is carried out in accordance with devised procedures

• Dividing work between workers and management in almost equal shares, with each group taking over the work for which it is best fitted

In Bureaucratic management
• A well-defined hierarchy. All positions within a bureaucracy are structured in a way that permits the higher positions to supervise and control the lower positions. This chain of command facilitates the control and order throughout the organization.

• Division of labor and specialization. Responsibilities in an organization are specialized so that each employee has the necessary expertise to do a particular task.

• Rules and regulations. Standard operating procedures govern all organizational activities to provide certainty and facilitate coordination.

• Impersonal relationships between managers and employees. Managers should maintain an impersonal relationship with employees so that favoritism and personal prejudice do not influence decisions.

• Competence. Competence, not “who you know,” should be the basis for all decisions made in hiring, job assignments, and promotions in order to foster ability and merit as the primary characteristics of a bureaucratic organization.

• Records. A bureaucracy needs to maintain complete files regarding all its activities and in Administrative management it thought, techniques of effective management that could be defined and taught. And that managerial organization hold as much importance as management as workers organization. It identifies the five functions of a manager which is being followed in most organizations today:

• Plan
• Organize
• Command
• Coordinate
• Control.

Behavioral Era
Behavioral theorists believed that a better understanding of human behavior at work, such as motivation, conflict, expectations, and group dynamics, improved productivity. They viewed employees as individuals, resources, and assets to be developed and worked with — not as machines, as in the past. Studies showed that human relations and the social needs of workers are crucial aspects of business management. This principle of human motivation helped revolutionize theories and practices of management. Maslow’s hierarchy of needs theory helped managers visualize employee motivation. As a group, these theorists discovered that people worked for inner satisfaction and not materialistic rewards, shifting the focus to the role of individuals in an organization’s performance. Contemporary Era

The contemporary organization faces unprecedented environmental and technological change. One of the biggest challenges for organizations is to continuously change in a way that meets the demands of a competitive environment. The learning organization can be defined as one in which all employees are involved in identifying and solving problems, which allows the organization to continually increase its ability to grow, learn, and achieve its purpose. The organizing principle of the learning organization is not efficiency, but problem solving.