MANAGEMENT OF BUSINESS
Performance of any business is largely determined by the quality of its management.
Sound management is necessary for any organization to meet its goals. Management is
a process, not an event. It is the process of ensuring effective and efficient utilization of
the organization’s resources.
This is done through planning, organizing, leading and controlling. These are regarded
as the key functions of management.
Planning: it is the starting point of any managerial process. It is mainly about setting
goals and working out how to achieve them. It involves deciding in advance what to do,
how to do and when to do it. Among other things planning is necessary to ensure proper
utilization of resources, anticipate requirements, helps avoid confusion and wastages
and helps in anticipating possible risks and uncertainties.
Organizing: setting up structures. This is bringing together resources and creating
productive relationships of the various resources for the achievement of goals.
Organizing process involves identification of essential activities, grouping of the desired
goals, activities and the assignment of duties. Workers are the mot valuable resource in
an organization, so a manager has to know his/her subordinates and their capabilities.
Organizing activities include staffing, training, acquiring resources etc.
Leading: this is about inspiring and influencing subordinates to work towards desired
or set goals. Leading activities include motivation, directing, supervision, communication
and anything that make staff work towards goals. A leader can be a manager but a
manager is not always a leader.
Controlling: this is about measurement of accomplishment against set standards,
and the correction of deviation where necessary. This checks if performance is in the
right direction towards desired goals.
Management Roles
A manager on a day to day basis finds him/her self-undertaking certain critical duties
that are attached to the management process. Mintzberg identified these as:
Interpersonal
Informational
Decisional
Management Skills
A manager is expected to have technical, human and conceptual skills. The mix ratio of
the skills differs with the with the level of management. Line supervisors are expected to
have more technical skills, less human skills and least conceptual skills. Middle level
managers are supposed to have more of human than technical and conceptual skills.
Top level management require more of conceptual skills than human and technical.
Motivation
Motivation is the drive that stimulates the interest of people towards a certain direction.
An organization has goals to achieve so workers need to be inspired to work towards
achievement of those goals. Managers and leaders therefore have to know how to
motivate their workers.
There are several theories about motivation categorized into content, process,
reinforcement and many others. The most used theory is however the content theory
pioneered by one Abraham Maslow. Maslow identified five sets of needs which he
arranged in order of hierarchy
First comes Physiological Needs which include food, water and sex. Next are Safety
and security Needs which include need for protection. Then comes Social Needs which
include need for love and belongingness. Fourth are the Esteem Needs which include
the need for achievement, status and recognition. Fifth and top most is the need for
Self-Actualization which include realizing one’s potential for continued development.
Maslow’s theory of motivation can be easily applied to work place situations. In terms of
physiological needs managers can motivate their workers through payment of decent or
‘living wages’. They can also consider providing free or affordable meals at work places.
Safety and security needs can be addressed via provision of protective clothing as well
as guaranteeing job security. Social needs can be satisfied through according workers
space to associate. Esteem needs can be provided through giving workers desired
responsibilities and titles. Self-actualization comes through giving workers freedom and
latitude to initiate ideas.
Another related content motivation theory is Fredrick Hertzberg’s Two-Factor Theory
which identified two sets of needs: Satisfiers/motivators and hygiene factors. The former
are higher level or intrinsic needs while the later are lower level or extrinsic.
Higher level needs, because they address intrinsic matters, are more effective than
lower level needs which address extrinsic issues.
Other leading motivation theories include Victor Vroom’s Expectancy Theory and B.F
Skinner’s Behavior Modification Theory
