Management Disagreement Ideals - Essay Example

Management Disagreement Ideals, and Realities based on Evidence Part Introduction Management in all activities of organizations and businesses refers to the act of organizing people in order to accomplish him the desired objectives and goals of the business by effectively and efficiently using the available resources (Bacal, 2004). The key management functions are planning staffing, organizing, controlling and leading the entities of an organization with the aim of attaining the desired organizational goals. Resourcing consists of human, technological, natural, and financial resource manipulation and deployment (Gomez-Mejia, 2008, p.21). Management facilitates the production of desired and useful outcomes in the system of organization. However, management faces many disagreements about its ideals which always exist. However, management realities can be established on basis of evidence, instead of what they ought to be. Managers are the business drivers of an organisations goals and objectives, so as to realise its realities. Therefore, management has many challenges that result into conflicts. Fortunately, if these conflicts can be solved on the basis of evidence, they can be turned into great opportunities for the business, rather than ideas of what they would have been (Pruitt, 1983). Hence, a skilled manager will always seek to turn challenges into opportunities by basing his decisions and actions on evidence. This essay looks into the disagreements that exist in business, how management realities can be established on the basis of evidence rather than ideas about what they ought to be. Some of the issues raised in the statement are what the disagreements and their causes, what are the management realities and what evidence are required. Management Theories In the past, management was looked at from the functional perspective, which is, regularly measuring a quantity and undertaking necessary adjustments of the initial plans in order to attain the desired goals, even without planning. One of the greatest contributor of modern management concepts, Henri Fayol (1841-1925, pg, 23) however considers management functions as planning, forecasting, coordinating, commanding, and organizing the activities of a business. However, Mary Follet (1869-1933) describes management as the philosophy of having things done by other people (Gomez-Mejia, 2008, pg 19). The difficulties of defining management, changing nature in its definitions, and difficulties of connecting managerial practices with the class or cadre of management shows how critical and difficult management task involve, since they finally dictate the well being a future prospects of a business. Management is equated to business administration in some regards thus excluding it in places outside business and commerce like public sector and charities. However, the reality is that every organization needs to manage its work technology, people and processes so as to maximize its efficiency and effectiveness (Gomez-Mejia, 2008). In all these areas, management encounter many disagreements about the realities of management. For example, when a manager wants to raise money to expand the business activities, he/she will face major disagreements about the risks of implementing such decisions. Unless he/she is principled enough, he/she will finally be discouraged. However, holdings the bull by its horn and investing with a passion and positive minds will ultimately allow him to realise the realities of the business goals. Unfortunately, listening to people’s views and objections would mean that the business will never grow due to failure to realise its goals (Amason, 1996). For example, if he gives in to people scrutinise and disagreements, he cannot take investment risks and hence, there is no way he can make enough capital to expand the business. Management disagreements vary from organization to organization. It is generally agreed upon that for managers to overcome some of the hurdles that come their way, they have to practice good decision making (French, Rayner and Rees, 2011). Decision making in any business is key to the success or failure of the business. As a process of management, decision making is necessary in areas such as directing, planning, staffing, controlling and organizing. It is the manager’s major role to make decisions that leave a positive impact on the company. The decisions should also not elicit disagreements that cannot be ironed out. The quality of the decision made by a manager will determine the kind of disagreements, if any, that are likely to arise. Management disagreements are also brought about by poor leadership within an organization (French, Rayner and Rees, 2011). Different leaders present differing leadership styles. Fielder’s contingency theory of leadership states that there can be “no single best way for managers to lead” (Gosling, Marturano and Dennison, 2003). This means that in every kind of leadership style, there are strengths and weakness. Some of the weaknesses associated with various leadership styles can lead to managerial disagreements. However, if the leadership style is right for the organization, there is no reason why such disagreements should not be resolved before they cause harm to the organization (French, Rayner and Rees, 2011). Another cause of management disagreement lies in organizational power and politics (Fairholm, 2009). In many instances, there are normally people with vested interests who would want to influence the management or decision making process in an organization. These people could be shareholders, customers and clients, directors and managers and even the employees themselves (Pfeffer, 1994; Kerzner, 2009). Managers in organizations have to ensure that they play the balancing act between the company’s best interests and power and politics. According to Fairholm (2009), every decision that a manger makes must lead towards the realization of the organization’s goals and objectives. At the same time however, the decision must at all costs not antagonise those individuals who have vested interests in the company. If this was to happen, there the manager would have issues and disagreements to deal with (Pfeffer, 1994). To avoid such scenarios of managerial disagreements, it is important for managers and individuals responsible for organizational decision making to make compromises that will not hurt business or any of its stakeholders (Fairholm, 2009). Yet another cause of management disagreement relates to the existence of communication gaps among management (Teale, 2003). This especially occurs when different managers with different values, and beliefs view their fellows negatively. Even without such differences, there are cases when disagreements occur simply because one or more managers are kept in the dark concerning certain decisions or information by other managers. As such, the managers who are kept in the dark may end up making wrong decisions owing to their lack of certain crucial information. As such, good communication should be at the core of the organization’s values to avoid certain disagreements. Skills of Resolving Management Disagreements Ideals through Evidenced based Realities Managers should expect to meet disagreements in their daily activities since they are normal and necessary business’s development parts (Manfred, 2003, pg. 26). It is through disagreements that the manager is challenged to work extra hard so as to meet the realities of the business. After all, it is never realistic for a business to smoothly run without challenges. Therefore, the manager should know to how turn the disagreements into management realities by basing his decisions on evidence. This is by learning the best ways of dealing with the disagreement, instead of avoiding it, which is very crucial. Mismanaging disagreements is very harmful to the general prospects of the business. However, handling disagreements positively provides a good opportunity for business growth, and ultimately helping the business to achieve its desired objectives (Manfred, 2003, pg. 26). By learning the required skills for successfully resolving disagreements helps managers to confidently face disagreements and ensure a strong and growing business environment. First, the manager should be able to understand the disagreement and its causes according to Newell (2005). Whenever there are disagreements in the business concerning things like motivation, values, ideas, perception or desires, an ideal management should positively try to solve the disagreement and seek to know how it can be used as an opportunity to improve business performance. The theory of employee involvement and participation can be very effective if the management can be able to apply (Kotter, & Cohen, 2002, pg. 76). This theory states that employees should also b allowed to take part in the decision making process of an organization. By involving them, they will be motivated to ensure that the organizational goals are realised, they actually proposed them. Employee involvement is also very healthy in dealing with cases of disagreements (Phillips, 2004). The management can look for evidence from the employees that will help it deal with the problems, besides positively addressing the issues in ways that will help the business reap opportunities. For example, motivation, values, ideas, perception or desires are the major causes of business disagreements. However, if the employees can be engaged in determining business activities through the process of decision making, such issues can become great opportunities for the business because; first, the employees will be motivated to work extra hard to achieve their goals. Secondly, employees will be allocated in areas that they have special interests in. This goes a long way in ensuring that cases of absentees, horizontal labour movement, low motivation and productivity are dealt with in the right direction. Kotter, & Cohen, (2002, pg. 76) says without doubt, the business will experience increased productivity, which results from employee commitment, maintenance of skilled labour, easy labour movements from one location to another, and enhanced team work. This way, the management will have turned the disagreements into opportunities that ensure positive business prospects. Besides easily realising business goals, the employees will also work in harmony with the management. Products and services from the business will also be of high quality thus competitive in the market. Consequently, it will be easy to win consumer confidence, and hence guaranteed future business survival in the market. A business is also likely to face disagreements at the management level. This is especially experienced when it comes in decisions that are aimed at investing a company’s financial resources or expansion through mergers (Dauber, Qureshi & Levine, 2009; Pinkley, 1990).). For example, two film production companies may want to merge so as to increase quality and productivity of their films. On the other hand, one company may want to sell some of its shares or branches to another, so as to realise required financial capital. This is a critical issue that the management has to search for evidence based on research so as to settle on the best decision (Kindler, 2005). For example, selling parts of its branches will ensure that it gets the required finances on time, thus meeting its goals on time and hence, it can undertake the desired expansion activities. However, merging is taking risks whose results can hardly be established through evidence. From the illustrations on the two types of disagreements that can exist in management of a business, it is evident that disagreements arise from varying needs of the players (Kindler, 2005). Everyone wants to feel supported, understood and nurtured but the meeting of these needs vary (Gomez-Mejia, 2008, pg. 38). However, the best way of dealing with conflicts in a business situation is basing management’s disagreements ideals on evidence, so as to realise the best results from that disagreement. Differing needs of creating comfort and safety are the very challenging to a business, though they ensure employee satisfaction and hence high performance. However, investment disagreements are much easier to handle through evidence because it is easy to research on the best action to take. On the other hand, comfort and safety are relative issues and therefore, it is extremely hard to know how to satisfy everyone in such concepts. Part B Correspondence Extent of My Current Practice and Experience as a Manager Disagreements about the ideals of management will always exist. But the realities of management can be established on the basis of evidence, rather than ideas about what they ought to be (Braybrooke, 1967). I agree fully with this statement which means that there can never be a singe style of leadership that can be satisfactory to everyone. As an IT manager for a human resource organization I have experienced many forms of disagreements within the organization at the two levels. This organization deals with the training of manpower for various companies. In my line of work, I have come across many cases and issues brought about by managerial disagreements. The most evident case involves how different people need to be trained to meet the various different needs of different companies. Some companies claim that the staff they get is either not effectively trained or the recruitment did not meet the required standards. The recruitment manager in the organization makes the ultimate decision as to who to recruit and who to leave out. The recruitment manager thinks that the recruitment is normally well done; hence there is nothing wrong with it. I on the other hand think that sometimes, some of the clients have to be given the benefit of doubt. Rather than follow what the books say should be done when disagreements crop up, the recruitment manager and I decided to fix the problem our own way (Teale, 2003). We decided to fund extensive researches that would look into the weaknesses and strengths of manpower trained in the organization, but who were working in their companies. The research also aimed at determining their achievements, failures and how they could be improved to enhance their performance (Richards and Greenlaw, 2008). This project was funded by the organization and fortunately, the manager was able to improve his training and recruitment methods. Consequently, the organization is now producing very competitive staffs that have seen many other companies contract our organization for recruitment and training. As an IT manager, the employment of modern technology through purchase and installation of modern equipments is a great challenge to the organisation. However, my decision to have the organisation apply application service provider (ASP) has triggered many disagreements from the management, just like Kotter, & Dan (2002, pg 32) says about how difficult it is for organisations to accept and embrace change in their organisations. Power and politics comes to play in this case since some individuals think that the introduction of something new will negatively affect business operations. Some managers and directors say that it will expose the company’s information to our competitor because security is not guaranteed, besides risking loss of important information in case there are no strong back up centres (Andersen and Schrøder, 2010). On the other hand, others believe that it will help the organisation access a variety of IT services at low cost, without tying the company’s capital into technology only, and enjoying quality services from skilled and IT experienced staff at no extra expensive for the organisation. To prevent these conflicts from affecting the organization’s modus operandi, I normally try to explain the new changes to everyone so that they may understand the benefits of having such changes. If they still do not agree with my proposition, I normally welcome any alternative ideas (Teale, 2003). Introducing change to an organization is never easy. As an IT manager I have to introduce new technologies to the organization all the times. As stated earlier not all the changes that I propose are normally accepted with open arms. In some cases, I am kept in the dark regarding certain decisions made by my peers as a result of non-communication. This means that I have to apply critical leadership styles to convince the managers and employees of the benefits of having some of the technology that I propose for the organization (Andersen and Schrøder, 2010). I try to ensure that the needs and grievances of every individual who disagrees with my propositions are recognised and factored into the decision making. Although I understand and accept the fact that there can never be a single style of management that can be considered perfect or without misunderstanding, I normally try to avoid any situation which can lead to conflicts which might hurt the company’s operations. I normally make my decisions after I have consulted widely within the organization (Richards and Greenlaw, 2008). This is how I try to avoid many managerial disagreements. According to my opinion as the IT manager, I have resulted into research in order to get solid evidence that the ASP Company that we will employ has adequate back up centres and data security like firewall and data encryption. After the research that proved the company met the required standards, the organisation employed ASP and consequently, it was able to save enough resources that were used to expand the business in other areas. Therefore, I believe that the disagreement ideals of management will always exist but the realities of management can be established on the basis of evidence, rather than ideas about what they ought to be (Braybrooke, 1967). The ways in which it challenges my own understanding of work and development is that, in the face of such disagreements, engaging on evidence so as to solve the problem always produces opportunities for a business, in agreement with Teale (2003). Conclusion Management is a tough task that requires not only training but also talents, and positive mind (Gomez-Mejia, 2008, pg. 2). Disagreements in management will always exist in a business but dealing with them in the best way always produces opportunities for the business. It is therefore upon management of various organisations to accept disagreements in their businesses and take them positively in order to realise the hidden opportunities. However, this can only be realised by investing on evidence, which can be achieved through research. Both disagreements, between managements and between managements and employees, need to be taken seriously but positively. Disagreements that result from investment are the most serious, yet the most common, but they provide the best opportunities for business growth and expansion. Therefore, it is the duty of every manager to seek evidence before reaching on a decision. References Amason, A. C. 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