At the beginning of the 20th century, companies were using scientific approaches to improve worker productivity. But that all began to change in 1924 with the start of the Hawthorne Studies, a 9-year research program at Western Electric Companies. The program, of which Elton Mayo and Fritz Roethlisberger played a major role, concluded that an organization’s undocumented social system was a powerful motivator of employee behavior. The Hawthorne Studies led to the development of the Human Relations Movement in business management. The experiment was about measuring the impact of different working conditions by the company itself (such as levels of lighting, payment systems, and hours of work) on the output of the employees. The researchers concluded that variations in output were not caused by changing physical conditions or material rewards only but partly by the experiments themselves. The special treatment required by experimental participation convinced workers that management had a Continue reading
Management Concepts
Overcoming Challenges to Effective Organizational Performance
The main obstacles to effective organizational performance is already covered in this blog and the ways to overcome them are discussed below. 1. Employees Training and Development The hope is that employees who receive training in line with their individual or organizational goals will become more efficient in what they do. Organizations should look at the positive effects of training on employee performance, and consider employee development as a targeted investment into making the front line worker stronger. More importantly, development plans that include “train-the-trainer” (training that trains employees to become trainers of a skill) can provide exponential benefits to the organization. This training can be anything from how employees can do their own jobs better to these employees being groomed to replace their supervisor. In addition, employees who are invested as a trainer might be further inclined to stay with the organization, and possibly reduce employee turnover. 2. Motivation Continue reading
Types of Information Used in Business
Information used in business can be either systematic or non-systematic. Our discussion is generally limited to information that flows through a formal system, but it is important to keep in mind the fact that a great deal of information reaches the manager from sources outside the formal system. Newspaper and other news media, conversations, and even a manager’s perception of a colleague’s facial expressions are important sources of information. Many managers give more-attention to such sources than to the formal reports. Information can be external or Internal. Much information that is relevant to the manager flows into the organization form the outside environment. This information can be systematic regular reports from trade associations, government agencies, and so for, or it can be unsystematic. Information from and about the environment that s rounds the organization is important, but we do not discuss it extensively in this book because of its wide Continue reading
The Role of Strategist in a Business Organization
Strategists are individuals or groups who are primarily involved in the formulation, implementation and evaluation of strategy. A strategist is like a root of an organization. In order to overcome the deadly traps in any organization a strategist must first think outside of the “box” and they must focus on both “forest and the trees.” They must need to concentrate on three aspects of human intelligence like Intellectual Intelligence (IQ), Emotional Intelligence (EQ), and Spiritual Intelligence (SQ). The mind of strategist must try to decide when to do strategy and when not to do strategy, clear target markets, competitive advantage, 80/20 focus and alignment. They need to do research, analyse the given situation with the available information’s and comes out with the best solutions. The heart of strategist must have the concepts, rules, power and politics play an important role in the development of any strategy. The end result Continue reading
Organisational Values – Definition, Sources, Advantages and Disadvantages
An organisation is an artifact, social entity, has structured activities, nominal boundaries and it is goal directed. Values can be explained in few perspectives according to various sources. In ethics, value represents importance of physical and abstract objects which is ideal accepted by individual or group. It can be also defined as qualities that are considered worthwhile that represent an individual’s highest priorities and deeply held driving forces. Values are often admixture with knowledge, norms and beliefs. Beliefs can be proven right or wrong by one but not values. Beliefs may vary by cohort, time, geographical differences but values are universal, true for anybody at any time, whenever an individual is. Organisational values are ethical codes that guide behavior by putting assumptions into practice. It also serves as qualities that an organisation appreciates and would require members of the organisation to chase after. Organisational values are ideology of an organisation Continue reading
Johnson and Scholes Cultural Web Model of an Organization
The cultural web provides a way of auditing an organisation’s culture. It can also identify possible barriers within the existing culture to change. The web can also be used to describe the way an organisation should look after a transformation. This particular angle is of importance for this management project, because management felt that there was a clear difference between the current cultural web and the desired one within the organisation. Culture is defined in many different ways. However, in most definitions elements like “basic assumptions and beliefs of an organisation or “the accepted way of working and behaving in an organisation” are included. Johnson and Scholes describe organisational culture as: “the deeper level of basic assumptions and beliefs that are shared by members of an organisation, that operate unconsciously and define, in a basic fashion, an organisation’s view of itself and its environment.” The assumptions and beliefs are in Continue reading