Anagement Decision Making - Important vs Urgent Work - Term Paper Example

Running Head: Management Decision Making: A system approach Management Decision Making: A system approach Problematic situation: Problematic situation i.e., urgent & important work. The following two approaches are most relevant to generalized as well as at focal level in every work situation. Either its managerial task or production operation task in an industry , services oriented task in service industry or its some personal task at family level , one has always to differentiate the difference between urgent tasks and important tasks. If one is unable to make a difference in between urgent and important , he will have to pay heavy price in term of certain losses that vary from situation to situation and will be discussed in detail. Brief description of the situation. Now a days the world of business is not traditional ,here all the level of management either mid level of management or top level of management or even the leadership level (decision makers ) are in a trouble to differentiate between IMPORTANT AND URGENT TASKS. The losses of misunderstanding between urgent & important very from situation to situation, if one has misjudged between two at leadership level in an organization the cost bear might be in total loss of customer and finally organization might be out of business in long term. The benefits accumulated at short term cannot be compared at benefits in the long term, its just like to differentiate between the two is URGENT & IMPORTANT. Sometime we follow urgency at managerial level in an organization ,the tasks like telephone ,mails, urgent inquiries, unexpected customer problems, some employees emerging issues compel even a wise manager towards urgency. Whereas the most important and long term tasks are neglected at the expense of urgent tasks. Keeping in view the all emerging situation and keeping an eye on future the wise leaders of five hundred top multinational companies not only spent an isolated time for planning, long term setting of goals, different roles, models, forecast time estimation and calculating risk factors (Gomez, 2008, pp.20). Even top leading companies in business plan a certain period for their managers at recreational place where they come closer to leading work force and help them to understand the long-term and important goals and roles to achieve these goals. It has been observed that cost of this trip at organization and the result achieved due to this recreational trip was one of important factor for understanding the difference between urgent & important tasks, Major one- important, minor one - urgent In all the areas of business universe one has to clear cut make a difference between urgent and important, so he/she should set in his mind in such a wise way giving IMPORTANT as major one and URGENT as minor one. This coding in back of his mind will act as driving force in certain crucial situation, which normally appears as tough or hard situation for others .It has observed that world leading lot in the world of business or in the world of politics apply same coding in their mind that's why tough is not tough for this minor lot of leaders. Gardening is one of important example to understand between URGENT& IMPORTANT, ONE WHO SOW SEED,WATER THEM, REMOVE HERBS,USE PESTICIDE HAS GOOD PRODUCE WHEREAS ONE WHO NEGLECT THESE FACTOR HAS BAD PRODUCE. Similarly one who has been brought up in a principled way or harbored these traits in himself is one who will be in a capacity to make clear cut distinction between urgent and important tasks in life. One cannot focus these tasks at business level, we have to distinguish at all level what is urgent and what is important in decision making. Choice of metaphors and relevance of important and urgent : Both the situation are important but some are of urgent need, depending upon end result requirement of the organization. The managers and even supervisors have to deal all these important as well as urgent situations at daily basis level, keeping in view the long term goal of the organization. One cannot make both tasks irrelevant because one has to use either one or the other one, so these two situations are inversely proportional to each other. If we increase one factor other will decrease automatically due to inversely proportional relation of the two. For example if we value the IMPORTANT tasks like planning, character building of self and the others related to us, first understand than understood, first things first, patience building, sacrifice for others, mutual respect building than we cant do the opposite because of inversely proportional relations of the two. So the relevancy of both can be measured and observed in all the sphere of life, in business world. In leadership world, in personal world, in corporate world. Even this phenomenon has been observed to operate at merger of organizations at corporate level. One to be {dominant} and the other {dependent}: I always prefer important as compared to urgent because survival of urgent is tightly linked with important. As for example in a an operational organization it is very urgent to cut down the cost, to keep it cost effective and within budget but its more important to look at the end of day for customer satisfaction which is not urgent in operation of an organization but very important for survival of the product. The relation ship of two tasks make it very important that we make logically one major and the other minor because one cannot make both major or both minor. One has always chosen one out of two. If one is choosing both major & minor at the same time the result is confusion in the system. For example in the world of politics one has to live a neat & clean life to earn a good name. One doing bad cannot earn good namedrop likewise one choosing URGENT cannot choose the IMPORTANT, due to the inversely proportional relationship of the both tasks. I always choose IMPORTANT AS MAJOR (DOMINANT FACTOR ) & URGENT AS MINOR (DEPENDANT FACTOR ) ii)' On the basis of above section (i) : Single methodology from the System of Systems Methodologies (SOSM). I have stated it clearly like a day that one has to choose only one out of two i.e., either URGENT OR IMPORTNT. If we observe at human level we make our decision consciously or unconsciously, as the coding of the two tasks as discussed above is a full process like gardening which involve cultivation of certain habits, follow the habits for years to become habitual ,than habits become character and this character become dominant part of the personality. We observe in life of Modern American is reflection of life of urgency. So its clear that one has to use a single methodology either consciously or un consciously due to set off his adoption of habits and characteristic traits which he exhibits. I select the methodology of IMPORTANT TASKS OVER URGENT TASKS. Making a clear cut value to important tasks as compared to urgent tasks. Choice of methodology and application of the methodology to chosen workplace issues. The choice is as simple as the working of brain, as in the moment of stress we make decisions depending upon what we are coded in our brain or for what we had preparing for years consciously or unconsciously in back up of our mind. So I prefer most of the time important tasks over urgent task. As I have designed myself as a leader of the business world. I usually differentiate the task in hand either its urgent or unimportant in nature. The focus ultimately is on important task as planning for future, organizing different goals and setting different roles for completion of these goals, planning deadline tasks and evaluation of these tasks keeping in view the past and present but looking at future, close observation of all procedural tasks and plan how to improve efficiency of machine and effectiveness of human resource. The present day top management makes a big mistake or even blunder while evaluating human resource they plan in term of efficiency and neglecting the important factor that human can be handled wisely when dealt in term of effectiveness not efficiency. Wise leaders or top managers always think in such away or design such strategies which normally bring out human resource at creative level. To make one creative they see themselves in their shoes and observing the situation from their point of view. In this way they are at level of understanding of importance of tasks from others point of view. They communicate openly without any barriers at an level, even something or someone point of view pinch them from inner but they give importance to them . 1- Introduction: To deal with creativity in certain areas of life is hard as compared to just following the usual routines of work. As for as creativity of URGENT & IMPORTANT is concerned its like coding of genes in term of genetics, its not exactly alike but has resemblance which I will discuss below. so if one is brought up in urgency and want to implement the style of important it will work. One has to first work on self to make a distinction in business world as well as personal level. One has to follow certain set of habits over a long period of life, say ten to fifteen years of repetition of habits, which are embodied in character to construct a leading personality which can distinguish between urgent and important tasks of life, which will ultimately effect long term goal achievement of life, The people like Gandhi were not created in a single step but they were created step by step to lead a nation of third world. Similarly the business leader like Suzuki followed the same pattern of distinction between urgent and important. There is law of creativity which is accepted universally according to which more hardships ultimately leads to construction of a principled person who can distinguish between urgent and important task. Failure is key to success. So ultimately the top management leader when gone through all phases of business and personal life ultimately develop policy which strengthens importance over urgent tasks. 2- Choice: Human brain is designed in such away that it produce the result what the person say and what the person do, if one say something and do the same, he is also modeling the character which is time consuming character according to most of the present business gurus. But its bitter reality that we cannot produce business brain who focus on important tasks neglecting urgent tasks in shortterm. It requires homework to make a choice, only sensitive & delicate brain can feel the steps which has to be taken in future, which are important one, which are long-term based and result oriented. So to make a choice is to construct a first mission statement where one has only access at the day end, clearly looking at what will happen if choice accurately and what will happen if choice is unwise and one can calculate all the steps in his mind using his previous experiences one can make a better judgment, a judgment which will clearly focus on IMPORTANT TASKS OF ORGANIZATION. So ultimate result of this is beyond vision of human being, the choices our forefathers made and we on the shoulders of our ancestors are making better even best choices for the future generations who have to come and see the work of their forefathers as we did. Its ongoing process which benefit not only self, family, organization, society, culture, country, continent, even the world can be benefited from the choices which once were made. I even feel proud that the work we are doing was planned earlier and the people who planned are not among us but the work is ongoing, due to choice of urgent and important because they did what was important at that time so we are getting benefit to day. SO cultivating a leader is like fire that increases with the passage of time in terms of quality, in terms of quantity, in terms of abundance for all who benefit from the person and make a chain in the world, which ultimately will produce persons who will think - organize and done. The result is amazingly like synergy, which make two plus two five logical. 3- Analysis = Implementation Analysis of every situation is very important to make clear cut distinction have also in my mind that analysis is based on the facts and figures, on reality, on the basis of result oriented brains who want to create such results never had been in the history of business world. To understand it I will have to go back to original topic of urgent and important tasks. It is very important to know and only knowledge is not applicable in analysis because one has to gone through all the phases of life to make a wise decision to make a choice in urgent and important tasks at hand in business world today. One is always making an edge of himself while making worth (Craig, 2009). Analysis at micro and macro level, close camera approach, best suitability, cultural hindrance level, level of knowledge, expertise and patience in the human resource of the organization, implementation by approach of first understand than understood, first model than ask technique, In short at managerial level I feel the importance task much higher than urgent tasks. Urgent tasks like ringing bells of telephone, customer flow regarding different complaint of the products, e-mails urgency requiring much higher attention than other tasks in the hand. On the other hand of urgent tasks or pressing needs there are certain areas where more important attention is required like our one employee is retiring today and he served in our organization for thirty years of his life. Now he was expecting we the staff will handle his case. One of the top management was requiring report on further cut down expenses at regional office level; they were expecting that I was working on their needs only because top management is always at the top. Keeping in view the entire picture you can easily understand that one can handle the situation if he is operating from the base of long-term, so he has capacity and capability to handle the situation in a wise manners. On the other hand if the situation is miscalculated one can imagine the losses in terms of quality and quantity of the product and human resource. That's why most of the leading business schools trained their human resource in the most effective way by gradually increasing work load and wok pressures, so the person could wisely handle the situation from his long-term principle base (Kotter & John et.al., 2002). 4- Conclusion = Reflection In a well established organization the system is designed so strategically that utilization of all the resources that may be financial resources, physical resources or human resources that all is done in a selective way ,keeping in view the difference between urgent and important tasks. One single mistake can lead to ever losing losses in terms of operation, services or implementation. We had observed people in our life at one stage they were quite pleasant but while making decision in their life they lose balance between urgent and important and result is disaster at financial level or physical level or at ethical level or even at the expense of ones own life. So the topic as it appears so simple but its living is tough, one always learn from mistakes and again he has choices weather he learns from his mistake or from others mistakes. Then this learning is coded in his nervous system at psychological levels. With the passage of time as technology advances one has to modify his learning accordingly and reset his goals and roles simultaneously, keeping in view the important task as important they are, than he can handle the day to day emerging situations of the world. If one response to never change his all the settings of goals and roles at business level become out dated and one day his product or services are out of market, although he was handling the situation in his scenario but forget to relate it with the big picture of the universe. We had observed that millions of people wind up their business due to above mentioned factor, those who learned from these situations ,later on become pioneers of the business world. References Gomez-Mejia, Luis R.; David B. Balkin and Robert L. Cardy (2008). Management: People, Performance, Change, 3rd edition. New York, New York USA: McGraw-Hill. pp. 20. ISBN 978-0-07-302743-2. Craig, S. (2009). Merrill Bonus Case Widens as Deal Struggles. Wall Street Journal. Kotter, John P. & Dan S. Cohen. (2002). The Heart of Change. Boston: Harvard Business School Publishing. Read More