Role of Manager - Essay Example

Running Head: Role of Manager Role of Manager [Institute’s Role of Manager Individual Differences, Personality, & Intelligence Since few years, there has been significant development in the processes and procedures of organisations around the globe, especially due to globalisation that has altered almost every perspective and thus, ways of performing things globally. In the result, experts (Gootnick, pp. 36-40, 1999) are now carrying out studies to understand different aspects of various fields, and this paper is an attempt in the same series that will look into the relationship of individual differences, personality, and intelligence with the role and working of managers in organisations. In particular, analysis (Haslam, pp. 23-29, 2007) has indicated that experience is one of the most imperative components that enable individuals to involve in the process of learning that subsequently allows effective execution of any work or task. In addition, it is an understanding that experience is the key factor that resulted in alteration of abovementioned three notions under focus of this paper. In this regard, one can state that experience plays a crucial role in ensuring effective development of managers; however, experts (Fumham, pp. 56-60, 2008) have noted that experience as mixture of personality, individual differences, and intelligence is not the key notion but the more important thing is the reaction of the manager in response to the experience. In other words, experience does not give lesson but one has to get a lesson from experiences. It will be easier to understand this notion by considering an example. For instance, a manager confronts a situation of an unsatisfied employee in an organisation, and he responds by talking to him personally. On the other hand, another manager confronts the same situation but he decides to consider employee as an under-performing employee without any discussion. The experience or rather confrontation was same; however, responses were different that would have resulted in contradictory outcomes in that organisation. At this point, individual variability or individual differences play a critical role in supporting manager in effective management of the people (Haslam, pp. 46-60, 2007). However, when it comes to individual variability, experts have identified strong relationship of intelligence with individual differences and that intelligence plays a significant role in enabling effectiveness in the work. However, individuals often view intelligence from the traditional lens related to academic achievement. In the context of manager’s role, traditional intelligence does not but the practical intelligence ensures effectiveness in manager’s functions. In order to understand the role of intelligence in manager’s part, let the paper include an example. In particular, a traditionally intelligent person refers to the easy understanding of academic facts that is applicable in the example of a student; however, a practically intelligent person means easy understanding of tacit knowledge (Fumham, pp. 69-74, 2008) that works in situation of the manager. In the case of student, knowledge is declarative, whereas when it comes to manager, knowledge becomes procedural that is a student focuses on ‘knowing that’ while manager endeavors on ‘knowing how’ notion that explains how intelligence, particularly, practical intelligence supports manager in effective execution that is effective management of people at the workplace. In order to understand the difference further, academic knowledge refers to information that explains behavior, and on the other hand, tacit knowledge means information that guides or initiates behavior. Further analysis of literature (Hosie, pp. 20-33, 2006) has indicated that there exist certain characteristics that facilitate managers in carrying out their works in terms of managing people, and that simultaneously involves self-development of the managers. In particular, tacit knowledge and experience were once again major traits that support managers in effective management of people. In addition, personality is one of the characteristics that play a critical role in influencing the ways of interaction of managers in their workplace environment. Experts (Hosie, pp. 61-68, 2006) believe that personality alters as an individual learns from his/her experience, and thus, as managers confront different situations while managing people at work, it is an observation that managers go through a continued process of learning, and personality indirectly helps managers in managing people efficiently. Moreover, it is an understanding that characteristics transform into a personality when they continue to exist consistently. Experts (Hunt, pp. 19-27, 2010) have identified that an individual acquires a personality through a process where characteristics act as tendencies in the beginning while altering with influence of external factors, and as time passes, these traits change into behaviors and finally, personality. Understanding of this process is very imperative to comprehend how personality influences or supports managers in managing people at work. It is possible that a manager will be introvert at the time of becoming a manager and his tendencies will not be resulting in comfort. However, as the manager experiences different situations and circumstances, it is likely that learning from these experiences will alter his tendencies, and thus, will develop his extrovert personality that will be very beneficial for him in terms of managing people effectively. Impact of Psychometric Assessments It is an observation that since ancient times until today, humans have been endeavoring to understand each other with the help of different measures, and this curiosity to know has resulted in a number of developments that nowadays allow particularly organisations to know about their employees and workers in the most understandable manner. Studies (Edenborough, pp. 30-48, 2000) have indicated that organisations spend thousands of pounds annually on different tests and approaches that enable them to identify different characteristics and preferences of their workforce that then facilitates organisations in creating the workplace policies and plans. In such ways, psychometric test is one of the most common tools that help organisations in measuring different personality types and learning styles of the workers. Analysis (Carter, pp. 36-45, 2003) has identified that managers are one of the major beneficiaries of psychometric tests as results of these tests ease out the task of managing people in the most efficient manner. In particular, it becomes easier to deal and manage people when one knows about their different traits and characteristics. In this regard, psychometric tests play the role of facilitators that enable managers in understanding personality traits of their employees, and subsequently, it allows managers to come up with different approaches to deal with different people. This importance of psychometric tests is visible from spending of organisations in the United Kingdom as they spend approximately twenty million pounds every year on psychometric assessments. Experts (Rust, pp. 35-43, 2009) believe that understanding someone’s personality is the most significant factor that can ease out a number of processes, and thus, psychometric tests fulfill the requirement for the managers that allows them to deal with the employees effectively. However, opponents have argue that although psychometric tests is an efficient tool that facilitates managers, however, they argue that dependency on psychometric tests somehow reduce or diminish personal skills of managers to understand different personality traits of employees at the workplace, and thus, this can be disadvantageous on long-term basis. Despite of these arguments, there is no disagreement on the positive impact of psychometric assessments on workplace effectiveness. It is an observation (Mader-Clark, pp. 50-56, 2008) that while fulfilling roles and responsibilities as managers, individuals have to involve in conversations and discussions with different employees and in absence of understanding about personality differences, such discussions may result in contradictory outcomes and can be very detrimental for the managers, as well as organisations. In the result, psychometric tests facilitate managers in saving huge amount of time that they would have to put on each employee in order to understand their personality traits and preferences. However, opponents (Bratton & Gold, pp. 20-41, 1999) once again argue on the cost vs. learning aspect of the psychometric tests. They argue that psychometric tests are expensive and at the same time, they do not allow self-learning of managers. Thus, although psychometric assessment is a holistic approach to empower managers with information about their employees, it is likely that managers will not develop in this aspect, and his personality will gradually become dependent on such tests to identify people. Besides these arguments, analysis (Hayes, pp. 77-89, 2002) has indicated few major aspects of psychometric tests that are very beneficial for managers. In particular, psychometric tests while indicating personality traits and preferences of employees, allow managers to develop their psychological knowledge as managers often compare their own understanding of employees with that of psychometric results. Secondly, utilisation of psychometric tests enhances self-awareness of managers, as they have to put more efforts in executing approaches according to the acquired results. In terms of psychological knowledge, it is an observation that a huge number of managers are nowadays endeavoring to understand different psychological concepts after using psychometric tests on their employees, as they believe that understanding of such concepts will be helpful in applying results of psychometric tests at the workplace. In this regard, on one hand, psychometric tests facilitate and support managers in managing people at work, and on the other hand, these tests motivate managers in acquiring knowledge for personal development as well. Conclusion In conclusion, the paper has discussed impact of personality, individual difference, and intelligence (Williams, pp. 23-37, 2001) on manager’s effectiveness in first section while second section analysed the role of psychometric tests in supporting managers to deal effectively with their employees. It is an observation that managers confront a number of barriers during their dealing with people from different social and cultural backgrounds; however, factors and tools under focus in this paper are playing a considerable role in easing out the tasks and duties of managers in organisations globally. References Bratton, John and Gold, Jaffery. 1999. Human Resource Management: Theory and Practice. MacMillan Press Limited. Carter, Philip J. 2003. More Psychometric Testing. John Wiley & Sons. Edenborough, Robert. 2000. Using Psychometrics. Kogan Page Publishers. Fumham, Adrian. 2008. Personality and Intelligence at Work. Routledge. Gootnick, David. 1999. Action Tools for Effective Managers. American Management Association. Haslam, Nick. 2007. Introduction to Personality & Intelligence. Sage Publications. Hayes, John. 2002. Interpersonal Skills at Work. Routledge. Hosie, Peter. 2006. Happy-performing Managers. Edward Elgar Publishing. Hunt, Earl. 2010. Human Intelligence. Cambridge University Press. Mader-Clark, Marjorie. 2008. The Job Description Handbook. Delting Printing Solution, Inc. Rust, John. 2009. Modern Psychometrics. Routledge. Williams, Chuck. 2001. Effective Management. Southwestern Publishing. Read More