Philosophies of Management: Taylors and Belbins Approaches - Assignment Example

 Management Philosophies Introduction: Management philosophies have undergone some changes over the years, in response to the environment. This Paper will attempt to compare two management philosophies - Taylor’s scientific management, which is characterized as a foundational approach and Belbin’s tem roles which falls under the category of modern management approaches. Taylor’s system of management divided organizational tasks and brought about a specialization of labor during the industrial age. Belbin’s team roles appear to be more relevant in the context of organizations in the present day, which are more service oriented. Taylor’s philosophy of management also introduced a more hierarchical set up within organizations, while Belbin’s team roles seeks to mitigate such hierarchical frameworks and bring about a greater level of networking through the use of a team oriented approach. But despite the differences between these two approaches, there are also some similarities between them, such as division of labor. Taylor: Frederick Winslow Taylor was born on March 20, 1865 into a wealthy Philadelphia family. Both his parents were Quakers and Taylor was thus brought up from an early age to be self controlled and avoid conflicts with his peers.(www.stfrancis.edu). Taylor was an individual of a compulsive nature and earned an engineering degree while also holding down a full time job at the same time. He worked as a machinist and pattern maker in Philadelphia at the Enterprise Hydraulic Works and during this time, his observations led him to the belief that the secret of productivity was in finding the right challenge for each person and rewarding him for doing that job. He worked at many jobs and developed his principles of Scientific Management on the basis of his experience and observations: Taylor’s philosophy: Scientific management was particularly appropriate in the framework of the industrial and economic growth that was occurring in the late 19th century. The focus of his Taylor’s efforts were centered on finding the least wasteful, most efficient methods to carry out organizational tasks.(Darmody, 2007). There are three major aspects of the scientific management philosophy of management. These are (a)science vs rule of thumb (b) harmony rather than discord (c) maximum output vs restricted output and (d) developing the greatest efficiency in workers (Darmody, 2007). A major part of the scientific management process is to simplify organizational tasks by dividing them into sections and routing the tasks to groups of workers who are not necessarily skilled, but who can perform those repetitive tasks faster than those individuals who are engaged to complete all the processes in the task, which requires a higher degree of skill. The underlying premise of Taylor’s philosophy was the development of a more scientific approach to management rather than the rule of thumb approach. Work was to be divided between management and the workers in near equal shares, with each group of workers taking over the jobs that they were most fit for. As a result, this produced an organizational hierarchy, where each person had his or her place in the organizational hierarchy. There was a clear delineation of authority, task specialization, management by exception, the separation of planning activities from actual organizational tasks and the introduction of incentive schemes for workers.(www.accel-team.com). The introduction of purely monetary incentives for workers is one of the aspects of Taylor’s theory that is most criticized. In effect, by dividing organizational tasks into repetitive tasks to be performed over and over by workers in the interest of achieving speed, human beings are equated to machines. Further more, his views that maximization of profit was the only objective to be achieved and that workers would thus be satisfied by money alone has also been criticized (www.accel-team.com). But his management philosophy was significant in that it introduced division of labor and specialization of tasks and a scientific way of completing organizational tasks, as opposed to the small scale methods which had existed up to that point. His methods were successful in changing organizations into large scale entities where production control and other organizational functions were facilitated. Belbin: Dr. Meredith Belbin graduated in Classics and Psychology from Cambridge and continued training at the Institute of Engineering Production at Birmingham. Later, he also became a Senior Associate of the Institute of Management studies in Cambridge. (www.belbin.com). This helped him hone his ideas on management. This was also supplemented by his insight into leadership gleaned during his years working as a visiting professor in leadership at Exeter. He has written several books on management and also functioned in the role of a Government Consultant. Belbin’s philosophy: Belbin’s management philosophy centers around the strength of team work in achievement of organizational goals. He has identified nine separate roles with an individual team or group of people working together, where the role of the leader is complementary with the rest of the team, rather than the assuming of a superior position (Belbin, 2004). Functionally, Belbin’s roles are divided into three categories (a) doing (action) (b) thinking (problem solving) and (c) People (feelings). Under the first category, Belbin identifies there distinct roles (i) Implementer – a disciplined, reliable, conservative efficient person who takes basic ideas and makes them work but who may be inflexible on occasion (b) Shaper – who is energetic and thrives under pressure, challenging others to move forward although s/he may be easily provoked and insensitive to the feelings of others, and (iii) Completer – who is conscientious and detail oriented and therefore able to ensure that the task is completed on time with wrinkles ironed out although s/he may tend to worry and be reluctant to delegate tasks.(www.changingminds.org) Similarly, in the problem solving category, Belbin identifies there separate roles (i) the Plant – a creative, imaginative individual who is able to come up with original, creative ideas and solutions to difficult problems, but may ignore details (ii) Monitor – who is even tempered and discerning and is thus able to assess the larger picture and think carefully about it, although s/he may lack drive and inspired leadership qualities (iii) Specialist – who is a single minded self starter and has special skills in problem solving in a particular area although s/he may stay in this niche and will tend to ignore other aspects. Within the last category of dealing with people the (i) Coordinator – is a mature, confident person - the overall leader who assists everyone in focusing on their tasks although s/he may be manipulate and tend to over delegate work (ii) team workers – who are cooperative, sensitive and disciplined, care for others and work well with them but may not be able to make difficult decisions and (iii) Resource Investigator – an extroverted, enthusiastic individual who is able to explore new possibilities and network with others but may lose interest after the initial enthusiasm has waned.(Belbin, 2004). From the above, it is evident that while each role player has specific strengths, they also have weaknesses, hence when these individuals work in isolation, they may not be able to produce effective results on behalf of the organization. But when individuals become aware of their own strengths and skills and understand their roles within the team, they are better able to deal with organizational challenges by functioning as an integrated team. When the various members of the team work together, the weakness of one role player is offset by the strength of the other and managerial efficiency is attained. When such a team works together, there is no specified leader as such, one or more individuals share the qualities of good leadership and pool their various strengths to provide effective management for the company. According to Belbin, a team must be well balanced in terms of primary roles if it is to function together effectively (Belbin, 2004). In order to achieve the best balance, she recommends that there should be a Coordinator or Shaper who must be the leader of the group, one Plant to stimulate new ideas, one Monitor to assess the big picture and maintain honesty and one or more Team Workers, Investigators, etc to carry out the necessary duties. In this manner, individuals who are well suited and possess the skills to fulfill a particular role can be assigned those tasks and the team functions well as a group because all elements are covered. Therefore, his theory appears to suggest that even a person designated as the leader within an organization, such as a CEO or President, must function as a part of the team, albeit he or she may be responsible for providing the guidance and leading on occasion. A study that was conducted in the UK by Fisher et al (2000) found that while coordinators and resource investigators are present in great numbers, there are few completers, monitor evaluators, plants and shapers. This finding suggests that a more balanced distribution of personnel may be required within organizations in the UK, in order to achieve better organizational output because the team philosophy of management is likely to impact positively upon organizational performance. Comparison of Philosophies: One of the major differences between Taylor’s scientific management and Belbin’s team roles is in terms of their suitability to the time frame where they were operational. Taylor’s theories of scientific management brought about a radical change in the way organizations were managed, at a time when most US organizations were small, independent businesses. His theory changed them into large industrial entities that could produce goods in mass amounts at a much faster rate. As opposed to this, Belbin’s team roles is appropriate in the modern day context, where the emphasis has shifted from industrial mass production to service based industries and where people skills have become more important than repetitive task performance skills. To some extent, Belbin’s team roles is also based upon the efficient division of labor, but not in the area of industrial tasks. Taylor’s approach however was geared away from the holistic skills approach of skilled individuals performing a particular organizational task in its entirety, which was a more time consuming process. His division of labor is similar to Belbin’s team roles in that workers specialize in one aspect of the job and their skills are tailored to match that aspect. However, while Taylor’s system has been successful in the past, it may not be so relevant in the present day, where mass production has been taken over by machines. A higher level of importance is being accorded to worker satisfaction and productivity, and a team oriented approach based upon workers developing an awareness of their skills. Robert Blake and Anne Adams McCanse (1999) also identify a leadership grid, based upon which a team management approach similar to Belbin’s team roles is advocated and these authors believe that this leadership approach is ideal. Such a team management approach identifies leadership as a grid in which the various parts of the grid are interlinked with each other and various employees within a firm work together on a cooperative basis with an equitable allocation of responsibilities on the basis of the skills possessed by each individual employee. In order for the organization to achieve its entire potential, the underlying premise is that all the parts of the system , i.e, the people in the organization, must work together in order to achieve a common objective and piece meal objectives are unlikely to work. The authors recognize however that implementing an integrated system may be difficult in practice and have therefore recommended that managers in the organization foster team work and encourage employees by motivating them to reach higher levels of achievement. This is the same philosophy underlying Belbin’s team roles, since the maximum managerial efficiency is likely to be achieved when the different strengths of team members is pooled to arrive at a coordinated whole. Team members can be assigned tasks on the basis of their individual strengths and skills, while their weaknesses are likely to be downplayed and counterbalanced by the strengths of others in the team. Taylor’s scientific approach was significant because it introduced an organizational set up and operational style which was very successful and appropriate for the industrial age. It also introduced the profit making incentive, suggesting that there was less waste and greater efficiency when workers could perform repetitive tasks for which they could be motivated by money. However, within a global economy, there is now a greater concentration of service based industries where the hierarchical organizational set up advocated by Taylor may be increasingly inappropriate. There is a greater focus on improving worker satisfaction and motivating them intrinsically rather than merely focusing on extrinsic motivation through monetary rewards. Belbin’s team oriented approach may be more relevant and appropriate in the present day organizational set up, since it promotes networking and interaction among employees and managers rather than streamlining and separating their tasks along occupational lines in a hierarchical framework. References: * Belbin, Meredith, 2004. “Management Teams”, Butterworth-Heinemann * Belbin’s Team Roles”. Retrieved from: changingminds.org/explanations/preferences/belbin.htm * Darmody, Peter B, 2007. “Henry T. Gantt and Frederick Taylor: The Pioneers of scientific management”, AACE International Transactions, pg PS151-154 * Dr. Meredith Belbin: Biography. Available on URL: http://www.belbin.com/rte.asp?id=5; accessed May 15, 2008 * Employee motivation, the organizational environment and productivity”, Retrieved May 5, 2008 from: http://www.accel-team.com/scientific/scientific_02.html * Fisher, S.G., Hunter, T.A. and Macrosson, W.D.K., 2000. “The distribution of Belbin team roles among UK managers”, Personnel review, 29(2):124-140 * Papesh, Mary Ellen. “Frederick Winslow Taylor. Available on URL: http://www.stfrancis.edu/ba/ghkickul/stuwebs/bbios/biograph/fwtaylor.htm; accessed May 15, 2008. Read More