ENGINEERING MANAGEMENT 3.

LOWER MANAGEMENT LEVEL

TOPIC 1: PLANNING TECHNICAL ACTIVITIES OPERATIONAL PLANNING
- refers to "the process of determining how specific tasks
PLAN can best be accomplished on time with available
- A plan, which is the output of planning, provides a methodical way resources."
of achieving desired results. In the implementation of activities, the - Responsibility of lower management that must be
plan serves as a useful guide. Without the plan, some minor tasks performed in support of the strategic and intermediate
may be afforded major attention which may, later on, hinder the plan.
accomplishment of objectives. Unit Managers
First Line Supervisors
Various experts define planning in various ways, all
of which are designed to suit specific purposes:
THE PLANNING PROCESS
 ALDAG AND STEARNS
1. SETTING ORGANIZATIONAL, DIVISIONAL, OR UNIT GOALS
"The selection and sequential ordering of tasks required to achieve
The first task of the engineer manager is to provide a sense of
an organizational goal."
direction to his firm (if he is the chief executive) to his division (if he
heads a division), or to his unit (if he is a supervisor).
This definition centers on the activity required to accomplish the
goals.
Goals - "precise statement of the result sought, quantified in time
 NICKELS, ET.AL.
and magnitude where possible"
Planning refers to "the management function that involves
anticipating future trends and determining the best strategies and
2. DEVELOPING STRATEGIES OR TACTICS TO REACH THOSE GOALS
tactics to achieving organizational objectives."
A strategy is just the starting point for your planning process. Tactics
make the entire process works with daily actions. Once you have a
This definition relates the future to what could be decided now.
set goal in place, you will want to know the next step once you have
 COLE AND HAMILTON
achieved that goal.
"Deciding what will be done, who will do
it, where, when, and how it will be done, and the
“Strategic is doing the right things — tactical is doing things right.”
standards to which it will be done."
- Debbie Donner of the Houston Chronicle
This definition provides a better guide on how to effectively perform
3. DETERMINING RESOURCES NEEDED
this vital activity.
When particular sets of strategies or tactics have been devised, the
engineer manager will then, determine the human and nonhuman
PURPOSE
resources required by such strategies or tactics.
Define "planning" as selecting the best course of action so that the
desired result may be achieved. It must be stressed that the desired
The quality and quantity of resources needed must be correctly
result takes first priority and the course of
determined. Too many resources in terms of either quality will be
action chosen is the means to realize the goal.
wasteful. Too little will mean loss of
opportunities for maximizing income.
PLANNING AT VARIOUS MANAGEMENT LEVELS
HUMAN AND NON-HUMAN RESOURCES
Planning activities undertaken at various levels are as follows:
 Labor
1. TOP MANAGEMENT LEVEL
 Equipment and tools
STRATEGIC PLANNING
 Facilities
- refers to the process of determining the major goals of the
 Finance
organization and the policies and strategies for obtaining and using
resources to achieve those goals.  Consumables and materials
 The top management of any firm is involved in this type of
4. SETTING STANDARDS
planning.
Standard – qualitative or quantitative measuring device designed to
 The whole company is considered, specifically its
help monitor the performances of people, capital goods, and
objectives and current resources.
processes.
 Strategic plan is "the decision about long-range goals and
- Promotes safety, reliability, productivity, and efficiency in almost
the course of action to achieve these goals."
every industry that relies on engineering components or equipment.
Chief Executive
Officer,
TYPE OF PLANS
President, Vice
1. FUNCTIONAL AREA PLANS
Presidents,
 MARKETING PLAN – written document or blueprint for
General Manager,
implementing and controlling the organization’s marketing
Division Heads
activities related to a particular marketing strategy.
Parts of Strategic Plan
Contents:
 Company or Corporate Mission – strategic statement that
The Executive Summary
identifies why an organization exists, its philosophy of
Table of Contents
management, and its purpose as distinguished from other
Situational Analysis ad Target Market
similar organizations in terms of products, services, and
Marketing Objectives and Goals
markets
Marketing Strategies
 Objectives or goals
Marketing Tactics
 Strategies
Schedules and Budgets
Financial Data and Control
2. MIDDLE MANAGEMENT LEVEL
 PRODUCTION PLAN – states the quantity of output a
INTERMEDIATE PLANNING
company must produce in broad terms and by product
- refers to the process of determining the contributions that subunits
family.
can make with allocated resources.
Contents:
- undertaken by middle management
1. the amount of capacity the company must have
- the goals of a subunit are determined and a plan is prepared to
2. how many employees are required
provide a guide to the realization of the goals.
3. how much material must be purchased
Functional Managers,
 FINANCIAL PLAN - summarizes the current financial
Product Line Managers,
situation of the firm, analyzes financial needs, and
Department Heads
recommends a direction for financial activities.
Contents:
1. Analysis of firm's current financial condition
 2. Sales forecast
3. Capital Budget
4. Cash Budget
5. Set of pro forma financial statements
6. External Financing Plan
 HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT PLAN - indicates the
human resource needs of a company detailed in terms of
quantity and quality and based on the requirements of the
company's strategic plan.
Contents:
1. Personnel requirements of the company
2. Plans for recruitment and selection
3. Training plan
4. Retirement plan
2. PLANS WITH TIME HORIZON
 SHORT-RANGE PLANS - intended to cover a period of less
than one year. First-linevisors are mostly concerned with
these plans.
 LONG-RANGE PLANS - covering a time span of more than a
year. These are mostly undertaken by middle and top
management.
3. PLANS ACCORDING TO FREQUENCY OF USE
3.1 STANDING PLANS - plans that are used again and again, and they
focus on managerial situations that recur repeatedly.
 POLICIES - broad guidelines to aid managers at every level
in making decisions about recurring situations or functions.
 PROCEDURES - plans that describe the exact series of
actions to be taken in a given situation.
 RULES - statements that either require or forbid a certain
action.
3.2 SINGLE-USE PLANS - plans that are specifically developed to
implement courses of action that are relatively unique and are
unlikely to be repeated.
 BUDGET - "a plan which sets forth the projected
expenditure for a certain activity and explains where the
required funds will come from"
 PROGRAM - designed to coordinate a large set of
activities.
 PROJECT - usually more limited in scope than a program
and is sometimes prepared to support a program.
PLANNING MAY BE MADE SUCCESSFUL IF THE FOLLOWING ARE
OBSERVED:
1. Recognize the planning barriers
2. Use of aids to planning
PLANNING BARRIERS
1. Manager’s inability to plan
2. Improper planning process
3. Lack of commitment to the planning process
4. Improper information
5. focusing on the present at the expense of the future
6. too much reliance on the planning department
7. concentrating on only the controllable variables
Among the aids to planning that may be used are:
1. Gather as much information as possible
2. Develop multiple sources of information
3. Involve others in the planning process
TOPIC 2: ORGANIZING TECHNICAL ACTIVITIES
ORGANIZING - a management function that refers to “the
structuring of resources and activities and accomplishing objectives
in an efficient and effective manner.” The arrangement of the
relationship of positions within an organization and the result of
organizing process is called the structure.
PURPOSE OF THE STRUCTURE
1) It defines the relationships between tasks and authority
for individuals and departments.
2) It defines the formal reporting relationship, the number of
levels in the hierarchy of the organization, and the span
of control.
3) It defines the groupings of individuals into departments
and departments into organizations.
4) It defines the system to effect coordination of effort in
both vertical (authority) and horizontal (tasks) directions.
When structuring an organization, the engineering manager must be
concerned with the following:
1) DIVISION OF LABOR – determining the scope of work and
how it is combined in a job.
2) DELEGATION OF AUTHORITY – the process of assigning
various degrees of decision-making authority to subordinates.
3) DEPARTMENTATION – the groupings of related jobs, activities or
processes into major organizational subunits.
4) SPAN OF CONTROL - the number of people who report directly to
a given manager.
5) COORDINATION – the linking of activities in the organization that
serves to achieve a common goal or objective.
FORMAL ORGANIZATION
- The structure that details lines of responsibilities,
authority, and position.
- represent the deliberate attempt to establish pattern
relationships among components that will meet the
objective effectively.
1. Organizational Chart - a diagram of the organization’s official
positions and formal lines of authority.
2. Organizational Manual - provides written descriptions of
authority relationships, details the functions of major organizational
units, and describes job procedures.
3. Policy Manual - describes personel activities and company
policies.
INFORMAL GROUPS
- formed when there are instances when members of an
organization spontaneously form a group with friendship
as a principal reason for belonging.
- not part of the formal organization and it does not have a
formal performance purpose.
- very useful in the accomplishment of major tasks,
especially if there task conform with the expectations of
the members of the informal
- ,"is vulnerable to expediency, manipulation and
opportunism".
FACTORS FOR JOINING OR FORMING AN INFORMAL GROUP
 FRIENDSHIP
 COMMON INTEREST
 PROXIMITY
 NEED SATISFACTION
 COLLECTIVE POWER
 GROUP GOALS
TYPES OF ORGANIZATIONAL STRUCTURE
1. FUNCTIONAL ORGANIZATION
- a form of departmentalization in which everyone engaged in one
functional activity, such as engineering or marketing, is grouped into
one unit.
- are very effective in smaller firms, especially "single-business firms
where key activities revolve around well-defined skills and areas of
specialization."
2. PRODUCT OR MARKET ORGANIZATION
- refers to the organization of a company by divisions that brings
together all those involved with a certain type of product or
customer.
- "appropriate for a large corporation with many product lines in
several related industries."
3. MATRIX ORGANIZATION
- An organizational structure in which each employee reports to
both a functional or division manager and to a project or group
manager.
- "is a structure with two (or more) channels of command, two lines
of budget authority, and two sources of performance and reward."
(Thompson and Strickland)
- "the matrix structure was designed to keep employees in a central
pool and to allocate them to various projects in the firm according to
the length of time they were needed." (Higgins)
TYPES OF AUTHORITY
1. LINE AUTHORITY - a manager’s right to tell subordinates what to
do and then see what they do.
LINE DEPARTMENTS - perform tasks that reflect the organization’s
primary goal and mission.
2. STAFF AUTHORITY - a staff specialist’s right to give advice to a
superior.
STAFF DEPARTMENTS - include all those that provide specialized
skills in support of line department
Classification of Staff Officers:
 Personal staff - assigned to a specific manager
 Specialized Staff - providing needed staff services for the
whole organization
3. FUNCTIONAL AUTHORITY – a specialist’s right to oversee lower-
level personnel involved in the specialty, regardless of where the
personnel is in the organization.
THE PURPOSE OF COMMITTEES
A committee is a formal group of persons formed for a specific
purpose.
1. AD HOC COMMITTEE – short- term
2. STANDING COMMITTEE – permanent and deals with issues on an
ongoing basis
TOPIC 3: STAFFING THE ENGINEERING ORGANIZATION
STAFFING - The management function that determines human
resource needs, recruits, selects, trains, and develops human
resources for jobs created by an organization.
STAFFING PROCEDURE:
1. HUMAN RESOURCE PLANNING
- The planned output of any organization will require a
systematic deployment of human resources at various
levels.
 Forecasting - which is an assessment of future human
resource need in relation to current capabilities of the
organization
 Programming - translating the forecasted human resource
needs to personnel objectives and goals.
 Evaluation and Control - refers to monitoring human
resource action plan and evaluating their success.
2. RECRUITMENT
- Refers to attracting qualified persons to apply for vacant
positions in the company.
3. SELECTION
- Refers to the act of choosing from those that are available
the individuals most likely to succeed on the job. A
requisite for effective selection is the preparation of a list
indicating that an adequate pool of candidates is.
WAYS OF DETERMINING THE QUALIFICATIONS OF A JOB
CANDIDATE
o Application blanks - resume
o References – written by previous employers
about the applicant’s character
o Interviews
o Testing – evaluation of the future behavior
performance of an individual
4. INDUCTION AND ORIENTATION
- In induction, the new employee is provided with the
necessary information about the company. In orientation,
the new employee is introduced to the immediate working
environment and co-workers.
5. TRAINING AND DEVELOPMENT
- refers to a systematic setup where employees are
instructed and taught matters of technical knowledge
related to their jobs. It focuses on teaching employees
how to use particular machines or how to do specific tasks
to increase efficiency.
6. PERFORMANCE APPRAISAL
- refers to the regular review of an employee's job
performance and overall contribution to a company. Also
known as an annual review, performance review or
evaluation, or employee appraisal, a performance
appraisal evaluates an employee's skills, achievements,
and growth, or lack thereof.
7. EMPLOYMENT DECISIONS
o Monetary Rewards – performance is above standards
o Promotion
o Transfer – movement to a diff. job at the same level
of responsibilities
o Demotion – movement to a diff. job with less pay or
responsibilities
8. SEPARATIONS
- It is a situation when the service agreement of an
employee with his/her organization comes to an end and
employee leaves the organization. In other words,
separation is a decision that the individual and
organization part from each other.
o Voluntary Termination
o Involuntary termination
o Retirement
o Layoff
TOPIC 4: COMMUNICATING
COMMUNICATION
- Communis is a noun word that means “common,
communality, or sharing”. Communicare is a verb, that
means “make something common”
- "Process of sharing information through symbols, including
words and messages." (Morris Philip Wolf & Shirley Kuiper)
- involves (at least) one sender, a message, a recipient, and
feedback.
WHY IS COMMUNICATION IMPORTANT?
Effective communication can help improve work relationships and
make teams stronger. It's essential for a team leader to possess
excellent communication skills and regularly get in touch with
employees and clients to ensure they are happy. In addition,
communication is often the best way to resolve a conflict between
two or more people.
FOUR FUNCTIONS OF COMMUNICATION
1. INFORMATIVE/INFORMATION FUNCTION
- One of the basic communication functions is to provide
information.
- maybe used for decision-making at various work levels in the
organization.
2. MOTIVATION FUNCTION
- uses a person’s desire to communicate to motivate them in coming
out of their shell. Goal formation, feedback and reward are
necessary tools to stimulate motivation.
- quite useful in enticing people to take a step further. For their
betterment. This leads to improved efficiency and productivity and
helps both the employees and the organization to reach their goals
and objectives.
3. REGULATION / CONTROL FUNCTION
- show how people use interactions to control the behavior of other
people.
- used by management to maintain control over their employees and
direct their efforts to better channels.
4. THERAPEUTIC/EMOTIVE FUNCTION
- helps to improve the emotional well-being of a person.
- the best way for people in a workplace to share their feelings of
satisfaction and even frustrations.
COMMUNICATION PROCESS
1. DEVELOP AN IDEA
- It is important that the idea to be conveyed must be useful or of
some value.
2. ENCODE
- encode the idea into words, illustrations, figures, or other symbols
suitable for transmission.
3. TRANSMIT
- the message is now ready for transmission through the use of an
appropriate communication channel. Among the various channels
used include the spoken word, body movements, the written word,
television, telephone, radio, an artist's paint, electronic mail, etc.
4. RECEIVE
- The requirement is for the receiver to be ready to receive at the
precise moment the message relayed by the sender. In any case,
communication stops when the machine is not turned or turned on
to receive the message, or the person assigned to receive the
message does not listen or pay attention properly.
5. DECODE
- means translating the message from the sender into a form that
will have meaning to the recipient.
6. ACCEPT
o the accuracy of the message;
o whether or not the sender has the authority to send the
message and/or require action; and
o the behavioral implications for the receiver
7. USE
8. PROVIDE FEEDBACK
FORMS OF COMMUNICATION
1. VERBAL COMMUNICATION
- Those transmitted through hearing or sight.
 ORAL COMMUNICATION – five senses are involved
 VERBAL COMMUNICATION - sender seeks to
communicate through the written word.
- sometimes, preferred over the oral communication
because of time and constraints.
- has limitations and to remedy these, some means are
devised.
2. NONVERBAL COMMUNICATION
- conveying the message through body language, as well as the use
of time, space, touch, clothing, appearance, and aesthetic elements.
- Nonverbal expressions convey many shades of meaning and it is to
the advantage of the communicator to understand what messages
are relayed.
THREE BARRIERS TO COMMUNICATION
1. PERSONAL BARRIERS
- These barriers cloud the communicator's ability to judge correctly
to the real meaning of messages received, hard to communicate
with each other and frustrate communication efforts.
2. PHYSICAL BARRIERS
- interferences to effective communication occurring in the
environment where the communication is undertaken.
3. SEMANTIC BARRIERS
- interference with the reception of a message that occurs when the
message is misunderstood even though it is received exactly as
transmitted.
OVERCOMING BARRIERS TO COMMUNICATION
o Use feedback
o Repeat messages
o Use multiple channels
o Use simplified language
MANAGEMENT INFORMATION SYSTEM
- defined by Boone and Kurtz as "an organized method of
providing past, present, and projected information on
internal operations and external intelligence for use in
decision making.”
- used by corporate firms consists of "written and
electronically
- based systems for sending reports, memos, bulletins, and
the like." The system allows managers of the different
departments within the firm to communicate with each
other.
THE PURPOSE OF MIS
 To provide a basis for the analysis of early warning signals
that can originate both externally and internally.
 To automate routine clerical operations like pay-roll and
inventory reports.
 To assist managers in making routine decisions like
scheduling orders, assigning orders to machine, and
recording supplies.
 To provide the information necessary for management to
make strategic or nonprogrammed decisions.

TECHNIQUES FOR COMMUNICATING IN ORGANIZATIONS

1. DOWNWARD COMMUNICATION - refers to message flows from
higher levels of authority to lower levels. Purposes:
o to give instructions
o to provide information about policies and procedures
o to give feedback about performance
o to indoctrinate or motivate
Techniques:
Letters, meetings, telephones, manuals, handbook, newsletter
2. UPWARD COMMUNICATION - messages from persons in lower-
level positions to persons in higher positions. The messages sent
usually provide information on work progress, problems
encountered, suggestions for improving output, and personal
feelings about work and non-work activities.
Techniques:
o Formal Grievance Procedures
o Employee Attitude and Opinion Surveys
o Suggestion Systems
o Open-door Policy
o Informal Gripe Sessions
o Task Forces
o Exit Interviews
3. HORIZONTAL COMMUNICATION - messages sent to individuals or
groups from another of the same organization level or position.
Purposes:
o to coordinate activities between departments
o to persuade others at the same level of organization

o to pass on information about activities or feelings

Techniques:
o memos
o meetings
o telephones
o picnics
o dinners
o other social affairs