Management and Leadership of Marriott International - Case Study Example

Managers are people who do things right, while leaders are people who do the right thing” (Bennis cited in CSU06). Ideas about leadership and management are interwoven. Even though leadership and management styles have been written about much later, but research suggests that both these have been in practice through out recorded history. Different leadership and management theories have been espoused by different authors. The concept of organization culture has become popular since the early 1980s (Hofstede, 2005). There is a definite co-relation between culture and performance, culture and economic results, culture and sustainability, culture and strategic growth, culture and recruitment, motivation and retention of human capital, including downsizing. "Organizational culture is the key to organizational excellence... and the function of leadership is the creation and management of culture…" (Schein, 1992). Schein emphasizes that culture differentiates one organization from another and provides a sense of identity to the members. Cultures are deep seated, pervasive and complex and he stresses that adaptation and change are not possible without making changes that affect culture. Both leaders and managers are largely responsible in creating and maintaining a healthy organizational culture. This paper will discuss how this takes place at Marriott International. Marriott International has always been known as an employee-oriented family atmosphere organization. The philosophy of the founder of Marriott was “Take care of Marriott people and they will take care of Marriott guests” (Cannon, 2002). They were in essence attempting to satisfy both their internal and external customers. They believe that “Hands-on managers” are absolutely vital to continuing the Marriott culture. At this point it is essential to differentiate between leadership and management. Management has been defined as the “mental and physical effort to coordinate diverse activities to achieve desired results” (Eric, n.d.). The four management functions include planning, staffing, organizing and controlling. Leadership on the other hand has been defined as “natural and learned ability, skill and personal characteristics to conduct interpersonal relations, which influence people to take desired actions. You lead people and you manage things, is how Pejza differentiates. Thus effective leadership requires accomplishment and influencing. Leadership requires trust and commitment of others, which they can achieve through their own behavior and integrity. Management has to be followed and obeyed. Leadership differs from the four management functions. As far as a healthy organizational culture is concerned, both managers and leaders have a significant role to play. Culture is important to an organization because it helps to cope with its environment, according to Edgar Schien (NDU, n.d.). Marriott decided that quality would be their new culture which would be well integrated into their business plan. The five different functions at Marriott include finance, people, product and service, sales and marketing, and development (Dodwell & Simmons, 1994). Each of these functions individually and collectively contributes to quality. All the elements had to be integrated into a quality manner so that the jigsaw picture fits easily into a larger picture – that of the outside world. This implies that the strategy for quality had to fit into the demands of the competitive market place. In line with their employee-oriented philosophy, the middle managers at Marriott were given the responsibility to involve and empower the staff, encourage participation, give them authority to do things they could never think of doing. This led to the frustration among the middle managers who felt lost and neglected. They were confused about their position in the new structure. The organization then realized that before they could have a bottom-up culture, they needed to have a top-down education and learning process in place. They needed to look back and take stock of what had been achieved, they needed to identify the problem areas, and they needed to rethink their approach, without losing momentum. Marriott concentrated on managers rather than leaders. If leaders are confronted with problems it is their inability to evaluate and analyze organizational cultures. Their strategies for new vision often fail as they are inconsistent with the organizational culture. The existing culture has to be first analyzed and understood before trying to introduce change. As managers, they were trying to manage things at Marriott, rather than lead people. Subsequently Marriott started a quality circle program and selected circle leaders who were put under a two-day training program. Marriott had 65 circles operating in 11 hotels within three months. This led to high motivation, involvement and participation. Within six months obstacles started to appear and issues were being raised. The middle management was uncooperative and the managers could not attend hotel meetings due to preoccupation with business. The managers, who could previously tackle the problems on their own, ignored the problems and the attitude was that staff had been empowered to take decisions. The top management at Marriott had assumed that the managers would accept the new idea without even questioning the facts. The problem at Marriott was further compounded as they had three types of managers – the committed and self-educated, the lip-service brigade and the old-fashioned cynics. Harris and Crane (2002) contend that cultural change is largely limited to modest behavior change but gradually cultural orientation is taking place in the form of market orientation, total quality management and innovation. It is generally believed that culture will cascade down from the management to the shop floor and such management espoused values will be widely shared and strongly held by all the employees. This assumes that the managers can manage the culture of the organization but it carries the risk that employee satisfaction level will fall. Resistance to change in the face of environmental pressure and uncertainty is caused by the organization culture, says Schein (Lakomski, 2001). In order to change the culture, organizational learning needs to take place, which would help the organization to deal with the internal and external environments. The leader can transform the current stagnating culture into a productive culture. To bring about organizational change it is essential to change the organizational culture. When the resistance to change appears to be non-rational, the dynamics of culture have to be understood. The organization needs to first unfreeze the old assumptions after which cognitive restructuring takes place. Thereafter refeezing takes place which means that changed behaviors and new assumptions become embedded and reinforced as the new culture through which the organization can solve the problems. In this change model, the role of the leader in managing change becomes important as he should be competent to diagnose and respond appropriately to changes in the environment on an ongoing basis. . The two major areas where Marriott needed to pay attention were training of the employees, including mentoring and coaching, and involvement with responsibility of the top management. Interpersonal relations between managers were strained, as also across departments. The managers had become indifferent when importance and power was given to the workers. Stress led to conflicts. Marriott needed to concentrate on three core sectors to improve efficiency – employee retention, attracting new and retaining existing customers and profit conversion. Progress also needs to be measured and communicate effectively as this can serve as a great motivational factor. The middle managers or the line managers are critical to any organization. Marriott should inculcate a culture of positivity and accountability. The four management functions are important for creating and maintaining a healthy organizational culture. Planning is an ongoing process in developing the business’ mission and objectives. Organizing involves coordination and control of tasks and the flow of information. In staffing which includes recruiting, retaining, hiring and training, it is essential that managers should be well trained so that retaining employees is easier as retention is a critical issue in most organizations today. Today the managers cannot afford to dictate from the top but the concerned people need to be involved in planning. The managers need to possess the people skills in being able to support, inspire, encourage, lead and listen to associates. Employees leave the organization or form unions when they are dissatisfied with the management. With the changed business environment, emphasis should be on soft skills like conflict resolution and stress management instead of technicalities. The management of any business according to the Deming’s consideration has two sets of problems – problems of today and those of tomorrow (Kruger, 2001). Problems of today encompass the immediate needs while those of future concern the purpose and dedication to quality improvement. Managers need to have a commitment to the organization and work towards its objectives on a long-term basis. Top management support and involvement is essential to bring about a change. They should be personally involved in inspiring quality (Juran cited by Kruger). The culture of Marriott should be such that every employee takes pride in what he does. There has to be total expertise from all departments to solve problems. This is possible with an efficient leadership because a leader leads through his own example. As far as the leadership style is concerned, transformational leadership is preferred over transactional leadership. Transactional leadership manages outcomes and aims for behavioral compliance while transformational leadership, through values, justice, honesty, truth and human rights, enables one to embrace a change of heart (Bass & Steidlmeier, 1998). Thus, leaders and managers have different roles to play in maintaining a healthy organizational culture. While the leaders need to lead through their own example, the managers too need to change. If they try to impose or control from the top it could lead to employee dissatisfaction. Interpersonal relations between managers have to improve. Management has to generate a cultural atmosphere in the company so that people are not scared to ask questions or make suggestions. Flow of communication across departments and different levels is essential. An organization needs both leaders and managers as they have defined roles. References: Bass, B. M., & Steidlmeier, P. (1998), ETHICS, CHARACTER, AND AUTHENTIC TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP, 08 July 2007 Cannon, D. F., (2002), Managing Service Quality Volume 12 Number 2 2002 pp. 87-99 CSU06 (n.d.), Management and Leadership, 08 July 2007 Dodwell, S., & Simmons, P., (1994), Trials and Tribulations in the Pursuit of Quality Improvement, International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management, Volume 6 Nos. 1/2, 1994, pp. 14-18 Eric (n.d.), Leadership for Excellence, 08 July 2007 Harris, L. C., & Crane, A., (2002), The Greening of Organizational Culture, Journal of Organizational Change Management, Vol. 15 No. 3 pp. 214-234 Hofstede G., (2005), People whose Ideas Influence Organizational Work, 07 July 2007 Kruger, V., (2001), Main schools of TQM: ``the big five, The TQM Magazine Volume 13 . Number 3 . 2001 . pp. 146-155 Lakomski, G., (2001), Organizational change, leadership and learning: culture as cognitive process, The International Journal of Educational Management, 15/2 [2001] 68-77 NDU (n.d.), Strategic Leadership and Decision Making, Ch 16, Organzationa Culture, 08 July 2007 Schein, E., (1992) Organizational Culture and Leadership, 2nd edition, cited in 07 July 2007 Read More