Organization And Management Essay

INTRODUCTION Control is the process of assuring the efficient accomplishment of enterprise objectives. In the turbulent environment faced by management, power and control is necessary to anticipate problems, measure performance against standards, take corrective actions for deviations from plans and if necessary, modify plans. The term control may have some negative connotations for some. In the management process, it is a facilitating function aiding the organization to accomplish the set objectives. The primary responsibility for exercising control rests with management at HQ division with the execution of plans. In an organization, control consists in verifying whether everything occurs in conformity with the plans adopted, the instructions issued and principles established. Its object is to point out weaknesses and errors in order to rectify them and prevent recurrence. It operates on everything, things, people, and actions. It is wrong to assume that only top management has the responsibility for power and control and that there is little need for control at lower levels of management. While the scope for control may vary to some extent depending upon the position of an employee in the hierarchy, all those who have responsibility for the execution of plans need to exercise control too. M/s Engineering Products is an engineering company, based in UK, manufacturing mechanical tools for various industrial manufactures .Due to the marketing trend and policy change, the company sometime in 1980 did some major deviations by closing and selling some units and presently in the trade of defense, industrial services and auto parts. The company is in the line of exporting components to different countries. It has processed for expansion, 50% of the employees are stationed in Western Europe and North America. Bulk of the sales is taken care by Western Europe and America and a very small portion by UK. AIMS AND OBJECTIVES The major prerequisites of control are two: a plan and a structure. a) Plan: controls must be based on plan. The more clear and complete the plans are the more effective controls can be; plans become the standards by which the actions are measured. b) Structure: There is need for a structure to know where the responsibility rests for deviations and corrective action, if any needed. As in the case of plans, the more clear and complete the organization structure is, the more effective control can be. Controls, to be effective, should share the following basic characteristics: Appropriate: Controls should correspond to an organization’s plans. Controls designed for a Management Executive are inappropriate for a supervisor Strategic: Control should serve a strategic purpose and provide spotlight on positive and negative exceptions at critical points. Acceptable: Controls will not work unless people want them to. They should be acceptable to those to whom they apply. Reliable and objective: Controls should be accurate and unbiased. If they are unreliable and subjective, people will resent them. THE POWER AND CONTROL PROCESS In the Engineering Products the control process used  Ã‚     involves three steps: (a) establishing standards. (b) measuring performance against these standards, and (c) reinforcing success/correcting deviations. a) Establishing Standards: Standards mean criteria of performance. Standards may be of many kinds and include verifiable goals set in qualitative or quantitative terms. Engineering Products has established standards in areas such as: (a) Profitability (b) Productivity (c) Market Share (d) Worker Performance (e) Innovation (f) Social Responsibility Standards are based on past performance, managerial judgment or scientific analysis. Standards are used to measure performance and judge success or failure. b) Measuring of Performance: Essentially, it is a comparison between â€Å"what is† and â€Å"what should be† the performance. Ideally, measurement should be done on a forward-looking basis to predict probable deviations from standards rather than merely be used as a post mortem exercise. c) Reinforcing Success/Correcting Deviations: When plans and organization structures are clear, it is easy to reinforce success and avoid failures. When deviations are noticed or apprehended based on warning signs, the reasons can be analyzed and appropriate corrective actions taken promptly. LITERATURE REVIEW POLICIES AND DESIGN CHOICES IN CONTROL Engineering Products are following three options in exercising control: centralization or delegation formal or informal direct or indirect preferences for one or a mix of all options are matters of judgment. Each option has relevance in a particular situation Centralization or Delegation Centralization is an approach where control is exercised by the HQ or the top management group.   Thus, functional autonomy will be lacking at operating levels. Delegation, on the contrary, manifests transfer of decision-making authority downward and outward within the formal structure. Sometimes, decision-making power is transferred downwards in a hierarchy prescribing limits on the scope and type of decisions. Centralized Control: makes it easier to coordinate the activities of various subunits/departments in an organization. seeks to achieve balance among various functions because the top management can be expected to have a broad organization-wide perspective. proves more useful because control will be in the hands of senior, experienced top executives. is necessary to meet extraordinary situations. is economical since duplication in activities and resource use can be avoided. Delegation and decentralization too have positive features: they relieve the top management from overload. motivate individuals to give better performance due to opportunities for individual freedom, discretion and control. contribute to the personal and professional development of managers.†¢ people at operating Direct or Indirect There are two ways of controlling. One way is to supervise subordinates’ activities closely, trace deviations to the persons responsible and get them to correct their practices. This is called indirect control The other way is to develop high quality managers who will properly understand and apply managerial principles, functions, techniques and philosophy, make few mistakes and initiate corrective actions, wherever necessary, themselves. This is called direct control. The higher the quality of managers and their subordinates, the less will be the need for indirect controls. Conflict and Negotiation Life is a never ending process of one conflict after another. Conflict has always been widespread in society but it is only recently that it has generated a lot of interest and has been the focus of research and study. Employees have become more vociferous in their demands for a better deal. Various departments in an organization face a situation full of conflicts due to a number of reasons like goal diversity, scarcity of resources or task interdependence etc. Negotiation is an attempt to find a solution that reconciles or integrates the needs of both parties who work together to define the problem and to identify mutually satisfactory solutions. In negotiation, there is open expression of feelings as well as exchange of task-related information. The most critical ingredients in successful negotiation are: 1 Definition of the problem should be a joint effort based on shared fact finding. 2 Problems should be stated in terms of specifics. 3 Discussions between the groups should consist of specific, non-evaluative comments and questions should be asked to elicit information. 4The groups should work together in developing alternative solutions. 5All agreements about separate issues should he considered tentative.   Without trust, each group will fear manipulation and may not reveal its true preferences. Secondly, integrative problem solving takes a lot of time and can succeed only in the absence of pressure for a quick settlement. Direct control hastens corrective actions, lightens the burden caused by indirect control and subordinates feel less concerned about superior’s subjectivity in rating their performance because in indirect control one would feel a close relationship between performance and measurement. METHODOLOGY The central HR function at Engineering Products had been placed on a different platform after the other units placed at different places are moving towards international integration. integration. A system is being formed for interaction of different managers of different units and how international postings to be managed HR department at HQ office desires to play a more forceful role rather than doing only doing routine administrative work. The Dynamics of Personnel/Human Resource Management (P/HRM) is a dynamic discipline as it mostly deals with ever-changing work settings, characterized by people having varied cultural, social and religious backgrounds, diverse goals, multifarious expectations and attitudes. The personnel scene itself has been changing quite dramatically over the years. State regulations, competitive pressures, unionization of employees, do exert a strong influence on the way the personnel function is carried out in various organizations. Over the years, employees have become more sophisticated in their demands for high quality work environments, adequate benefits, proper training and career growth opportunities. All these factors compel human resource professionals to look for ways to improve their interactions with employees, other managers and outside groups in order to maximize worker productivity and satisfaction. Changing Role of Human Resource in View of Social Factors: A number of environmental factors influence the work of HR office.They cannot perform  Ã‚   in a vacuum. These factors influence the organization through human resources. External factors separately or in combination can influence the HR function of any organization. The job of a HR manager is to balance the demands and expectations of the external groups with the internal requirements and achieve the assigned goals in an efficient and effective manner. The HR manager has to work closely with these constituent parts, understand the internal dynamics properly and devise ways and means to survive and progress. Local and State Factors State is the custodian of industrial and economic activities. The emergence of problems on the industrial front in the form of trade union movement, failure of many employers to deal fairly with workers, non-fulfillment of plan targets forced the states to intervene in human resource management and to enact various pieces of labor legislation.    Unions Unions have also gained strength. At present, these organizations constitute one of the power blocks in many countries. With the formation and recognition of these organizations, the issues relating to employee interests are no longer determined by the unilateral actions of management. These have to be discussed with union representatives invariably.   In consequence, the scope of managerial discretion in personnel activities has been narrowed down. Changing Work Values   Organizations must now advance from general affirmation and enthusiasm for the career development of their personnel to greater precision. The concepts and goals development programmes must be more precise, more widely understood, reflected in formal policy statements and translated into institutional and personnel practice. Alienation from the job, increasing counter-productive behavior, rising expectations and changing ideas of employees are some of the other factors responsible for the changing values and roles of human force. Consequently it has become imperative for the management to include  Ã‚   benefits to improve morale, introduce a machinery to redress grievances, encourage employee participation in decision-making and the like to pave the way for industrial betterment and to meet the ever increasing demands of workforce. Culture In Organization Every organization has some characteristics which are common with any other organization. At the same time, each organization has its unique set of characteristics and properties. This psychological structure of organization and their sub-units is usually referred to as Organizational Culture. Organizational culture is a relatively enduring quality of the internal environment that is experienced by the members, influences their behavior, and can be described in terms of values of a particular set of characteristics of the organization. Organizational culture is the set of characteristics that describe an organization and that (a) distinguish one organization from other organizations; (b) are relatively enduring over time and (c) influence the behavior of the people in the organization. Organizational Culture is a relatively uniform perception held of the organization, it has common characteristics, it is descriptive, it can distinguish one organization from another and it integrates individual, group and organization system variables. ORGANISATIONAL STRUCTURE. Organization structure refers to the formal, established pattern of relationships amongst the various parts of a firm or any organization. The fact that these relationships are formal implies that they are deliberately specified and adopted and do not evolve on their own. Of course, it may sometimes happen that given an unusual situation, new working relationships may evolve and which may later be adopted as representing the formal structure.   Only when relationships are clearly spelled out and accepted by everyone, can they be considered as constituting a structure. This does not mean that once established, there can be no change in these relationships. Changes may be necessary with passage of time and change of circumstances, but frequent and erratic changes are to be avoided. References Peters, Thomas, J. and Waterman, Robert H., 1999. Management of Development Programmes, Harper and Row: New York. Elbing, A.1998. Behavioral Decisions in Organizations, Scott Foresman: Glenview. 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