Challenges Facing Managers Today - Research Paper Example

?    Challenges Facing Managers Today Challenges Facing Managers Today Introduction Managers are currently being faced with a great deal of challenges, which have had a negative impact on the development and success of organizations. The quickly changing business landscape shows that there are numerous challenges which will continue to evolve over time. Managers who do not lay emphasis on attracting and keeping hold of talents may find their organizations in calamitous results, as their rivals may be beating them in the strategic planning of their organizations. With both the local and international competition, managers are required to make their organizations more customer-focused, adaptable, agile, and resilient so as to be successful. And within this transformation in environment, managers have to change to become a change mentor, an employee advocate or sponsor, and a strategic partner within their organizations. In order to be successful, management is required to be a business driven activity with a comprehensive understanding of the big picture of the organization and have the capacity to affect significant policies and decisions. Generally, the focus of today’s manager should be on strategic technological planning, talents development, and personnel retention. Managers should also be succession planners, coaches, mentors, and counselors to help motivate workers and their loyalty (Daniel & Radenbaugh, 2001). This paper will look at the challenges facing managers today. The paper will take a position and support it using information from relevant research. It is evident that today’s managers are faced with a number of challenges. The following include some of the most apparent challenges. A lack of resources in an organization can cause grave predicaments for a manager. A lack of resources may make the organization face cutbacks on significant things. This requires the manager to be economically minded and creative when this type of circumstance occurs. It is essential that a manager learns to make the most of what is available and check accessible resources to ensure they are not misused. Managers should also device ways of lessening costs on things which are of nominal significance so that there will be resources for necessary materials. Lack of resources may also have a negative impact on the training of employees (Brickley, Smith, Zimmerman & Willett, 2000). During training, organizations should have budgeted finances for travelling, accommodation, among other needs. If the managers cannot raise the finances to facilitate this, the workers will not have the means of gaining competitive skills, negatively affecting the performance of the organization. Another challenge facing the managers of today is their recognition towards input to business access and realization of the objectives of the organization. Some organizations do not see the significance of appointing managers when they have heads of different departments. Technological advancement is another challenge that managers have to deal with. Today, technological advancements are on the rise more than in the early period. Modern technology has to be utilized if an organization wants to provide goods and services which are cost effective, relevant, and congruent with the needs of the society. Therefore, managers face the significant challenge of raising the initial cost of acquiring, running, and maintaining modern technology. This is also made worse by the brief existence of a large number of technological inventions which imply that managers have to reinvest in contemporary technology often in order to protract their relevance (Hollen, Van, Frans & Volberda, 2013). This graph illustrates the idea that technological progress is both a continuous opportunity and a continuous danger to the organization. Trade unions are another challenge facing the managers. Trade unions can be extremely cruel when it comes to negotiation and they may urge the workers to engage in striking activities. This has a negative impact on the practices of the organization because the managers have the responsibility of offering a conducive and decent working environment for employees. Retrenchment and downsizing possess a challenge to today’s managers. When there is economic difficulty, the organizations are required to retrench and reduce the number of workers. This has a negative impact on the management and the organization in general (Daniel & Radenbaugh, 2001). HIV/AIDS is another challenge affecting the management of an organization. The management is forced to relieve the affected workers of their duties because the disease makes them incompetent. This is a significant challenge because when organizations lose able and very competent workers due to the disease, the productivity is negatively affected. Work ethics is a major challenge facing managers today. Individuals are still influenced based on their backgrounds and the workers do not look at people by their skills and expertise but their ethnic background. In other circumstances workers believe that if an individual from their ethnic group is the manager in an organization they should be employed and get rich, thus, they do not do their work properly. This will have a negative effect on managers carrying out their duties effectively. The duties in organizational management should be applicable mainly to ethical and accountability strategy. Also, the changing behavior of consumers is making the work of managers to be more difficult. Considering that today’s situation is made up of individuals who are receivers of the goods or services of an organization, the rapid changing character of people’s lifestyles, likes, opinions, preferences, and dislikes, is becoming a challenge facing managers because they have to device new and innovative ways of satisfying the customers (Mors, 2010). Managers today are faced with the challenge of generational gaps. Generational gaps have led to a challenge in understanding the behavior of consumers, yet a large number of organizations are substantially investing in consumer behavior analysis to establish the most adequate way of addressing the needs of the customers. Managers have been handed the demanding task of understanding the behavior of consumers so as to develop policies and strategies that may effectively deal with the needs of the customers. Unstable currencies and economies also play a part in making the roles of the manager more challenging. They cause a continuing instability in the management of organizations. Even though unstable currencies and economies has been recently been caused by a number of external elements, for example, political factors, amount of imports and exports, and exchange rates, it has made it difficult for managers to organize organizational activities in a way that is deemed profitable for the organization. This may also compel managers to reach difficult decisions such as dismissing and retrenching workers (Daniel & Radenbaugh, 2001). Finally, complexity is a challenge facing managers today. Business has become more complex, even as several activities and tasks have become easier due to information technology. The universal economy is becoming more linked, developing a more diverse and larger population of suppliers and customers. Managers are faced with the challenge of developing enhanced system-thinking capacities so as to design the business goods, services, processes, and models in a manner that lessens complexity (Brickley, Smith, Zimmerman & Willett, 2000). The image below shows the world’s level of diversity. Conclusion A lack of resources in an organization, recognition towards input to business access and realization of the objectives of the organization, technological advancements, trade unions, HIV/AIDS, work ethics, the changing behavior of consumers, generational gaps, unstable currencies and economies, and complexity are some of the foremost challenges facing managers today. It is imperative to note that these challenges have led to more strict procedures of recruiting workers, which try to examine the risk an organization introduces itself to when it offers employment to a person. This trend is new and a large number of organizations are struggling with it today. Management is intricate and necessitates motivation and skill. But most of all it demands commitment, the commitment to deal with these contemporary challenges. Therefore, there is need for additional efforts to be utilized if organizations are to accomplish their objectives. References Brickley, J., Smith, C., Zimmerman, J., & Willett, J. (2000). Designing organizations to create value: From strategy to structure. New York: McGraw-Hill. Daniel, D., & Radenbaugh, L. H. (2001). International business: Environments and operations (9th ed.). New Jersey: Prentice Hall. Hollen, R., Van, D., Frans, A. J., & Volberda, H. W. (2013). The role of management innovation in enabling technological process innovation: An inter-organizational perspective. European Management Review, 10(1), 35-50. Mors, M. L. (2010). Innovation in a global consulting firm: When the problem is too much diversity. Strategic Management Journal, 31, 841-872. Read More