Functions of Management - Essay Example

Authority and responsibility are distributed among the employees. The first thing that helps is the organizational structure, in the food and beverage business, it will enable the employees to know who is reporting to whom, where the information is coming from and who it is going to. The next important thing is the division of labor, who is performing what task and who is responsible for what.

For example, somebody is responsible for cooking the food, while somebody else is responsible for getting the ingredients. The waiter will deliver the food, while the chef will only cook it and he might come up with new recipes as well. There is one very important thing to note here, a leader. Being a good leader is the ability to influence other people's decisions and actions. A leader needs to motivate the employees and direct them towards achieving the goals and their duties and responsibilities.

Most of the leadership characteristics exist in one's personality. Leaders communicate and interact with their workforce on a daily basis. In the food and beverage industry, especially for a restaurant, it is very important that the managers are good leaders because, at dinner and lunchtime, the chef has to lead his assistants so that they cook the food according to his standards. At rush hours, there is time constraint and a lot of pressure on the chef and the assistants. Having good leadership makes the job easier as they know they have someone on their side helping them out.

ControllingThis is the last of the four functions; through this, the manager can enable that the plans are being implemented properly and that the employees are working towards achieving the goals of the organization. Controlling completes the circle of management. There are many ways of controlling employees; there are performance standards that are measured against the employee's performance. Evaluation forms are filled out periodically to gain insight into the performance of all employees. If the performance criteria are being met very easily then managers set higher standards.

In a restaurant, you might have seen how the chef keeps an eye on what is being made and sent out of the kitchen. This is a way of keeping a check and balance. Another way can be from the number of revisits you get from a customer. If the service is nice and the food is good, the people will come again.