AHBM - Internal Organisations LTS Notes

8/9/2019 AHBM - Internal Organisations LTS Notes

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NATIONAL QUALIFICATIONS CURRICULUM SUPPORT

Business Management

Managing Organisations:The Internal Environment

[ADVANCED HIGHER]


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Contents

Introduction 5

Section 1: Role of management

Fayol 8Henry Mintzberg 9

Peter Drucker 11

Rosemary Stewart 11

Conclusion 13

Section 2: Management theory

Classical school 14

Human relations school 16

Neo-human relations school 18

Systems theory 19

Contingency theory 20Conclusion 21

Section 3: Motivation to work

Maslow 23

Herzberg 24

Non-financial incentives 25

Financial incentives 30

Conclusion 32

Section 4: Teams

Role of teams in organisations 37

Group development 38

Characteristics of effective teams 39

Potential issues with teams 46

Conclusion 48

Section 5: Leadership

Manager vs leader 50

Leadership theories 51

Factors affecting leadership style 59

Conclusion 59

MANAGING ORGANISATIONS: THE INTERNAL ENVIRONMENT (AH BUSINESS MANAGEMENT) 3

Learning and Teaching Scotland 2006


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CONTENTS

Section 6: Personal effectiveness of managers

Time management 62

Prioritising 62Personal qualities 63

Section 7: Change

Factors causing change 65

Force field analysis 70

Stages of change 74

Factors to be addressed during a change programme 76

Resistance to change 76

Organisational culture and change 78

Approaches to managing change 81

Examples of change Operations management 84

Answers to SAQs 89

Exercises 100

Suggested answers to exercises 104

References 110

4 MANAGING ORGANISATIONS: THE INTERNAL ENVIRONMENT (AH BUSINESS MANAGEMENT)



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INTRODUCTION

Introduction

This pack contains student notes and exercises to support the teaching of Business

Management (AH): Managing Organisations, The Internal Environment.

Further details of the items included are given below. Overall, however, the

material is designed to reflect the fact that Advanced Higher places considerable

demands on students. It is intended to be challenging and to encourage students toengage fully with the relevant concepts and ideas. Teachers and lecturers should,

therefore, be prepared to offer support to students to help them to deal with the

material, especially during the early stages of the course. This should result in

substantial positive benefits for students who should develop a firm foundation

both for the Advanced Higher course and for future study.

Student Notes These provide the underpinning knowledge for Advanced HigherBusiness Management. Students should be encouraged to make use of relevant

textbooks, other library resources such as business oriented magazines and

periodicals (e.g. The Economist) as well as the internet to source additionalinformation on topics.

Self Assessed Questions (SAQs) and Activities SAQs are provided, together withanswers, throughout the text to develop students understanding further, while the

activities offer them the opportunity to undertake further research when time

permits. Answers to all the SAQs are provided at the end of the notes before the

exercises.

Exercises These include a variety of questions:

Some to ensure that the theory of the topic is understood

Some being summary case studies where student are asked to put theory into

practice

Others are research questions where students must investigate a situation and

suggest how they would apply the theory of what they have learned into a real

business situation.

In a number of cases use of the internet as a research device is suggested; however,

alternative written material is normally available from a variety of sources.

Suggested answers to exercises These are provided for guidance only. In avariety of situations there are no clear right or wrong answers, but students should

show a firm grasp of what is being asked, and apply their acquired knowledge to

the situation described. In many cases students should be encouraged to research




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the area of the question by looking at the business press (such as journals, daily

newspapers), the internet and other sources to gain a better understanding of the

subject area.

References These give the sources of the material used in the core text and, assuch, this represents good academic practice. They may help students who wish to

pursue a particular topic further or to a greater depth. It is not expected, however,

that students should access all the references directly nor that they should all be

immediately available to students.

The Internal Environment, External Environment and Business Report units can be

taught in any order; however, the Change section in Internal Environment is

particularly useful in linking the elements of the course together.

At Advanced Higher level every effort should be made to encourage independentlearning among students and to help them to prepare for future academic study. In

Business Management, this includes the development of an analytical, enquiring

approach and a recognition that there is rarely a single unambiguous way forward

in any particular situation. Any approach may well have advantages and

disadvantages, which need to be weighed against the pros and cons of other

possibilities. Students should be guided to consider why actions have been taken,

or could be taken, and what the justification for these might be.




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Section 1: Role of management

In todays world we all manage we organise our lives, accomplish ordinary tasks

and maintain routines. We manage our time, our resources and sometimes others,

yet we are not called managers. Those who are called managers are normally

people who are trained to employ, shape and regulate. They work in all types of

organisations from the large multinational company down to the small business.

Many people, indeed, are managers without that title for example, headteachers,bishops, newspaper editors, etc. but they all manage people and resources.

Management involves having power and control over people, although people will

accept this if managers behave in an appropriate fashion.

Management are a very important group within the business context. Without

managers, quite simply, its unlikely that things would get done.

Companies of all sizes employ managers. Managers are responsible for not only

their own work, but for others work too. In a small company one manager may

be responsible for all managerial work, but as the company grows, more

managers will be needed to manage the resources, including people, of the

company.

SAQ 1

What kinds of things do you think managers in an organisation do?

The role of management covers the part that managers play in an organisation.

Your response to SAQ 1 will have given you some ideas about what this involves.

Several writers have suggested ways in which the role of managers can beexplained. This section looks at four contributions. They are:

Henri Fayol elements of management

Henry Mintzberg managerial roles

Peter Drucker management by objectives

Rosemary Stewart demands, choices and constraints of the managers job.




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Henri Fayol

The Frenchman, Henri Fayol (18411925), was one of the first people to writeabout management. His work is the basis of the Classical School of Management

described in Section 2: Management Theory. His frameworks for the study of

management are still used today. His main purpose was to identify the one best

way of organising or managing. He argued that management consists of five

elements:

1 planning

2 organising

3 commanding

4 co-ordinating

5 controlling.

Planning is the starting point. It creates a framework for future decisions. It

involves setting clear objectives and devising strategies, policies, programmes and

procedures to achieve those objectives. For a senior manager this might be writing

a company strategy document covering the next five years; for a supervisory

manager this might be planning detailed work for the next working week.

Organising involves getting the right resources together and creating an

appropriate organisational structure to divide up the tasks. It also involves

establishing communication networks to achieve organisational goals.

Commanding or directing involves giving instructions in order that the necessary

tasks are carried out tasks could be carried out either individually or by

delegation to others.

Co-ordinating or motivating involves finding and training staff for the task to be

carried out and ensuring the staff are motivated to perform the tasks and that all

are working to the same goals.

Controlling is essential to ensure that organisational goals have been achieved.

It involves maintaining performance levels by monitoring and evaluation, i.e.

collecting and analysing key management information, comparing actual vs

planned performance and critically reviewing plans. A senior manager mightlook at long-term planned vs actual performance, whereas a supervisory manager

might be more concerned that work is of the correct quality and that the work is

done on schedule.

Activity

Consider Fayols five elements of management and apply them to a manager you

have some knowledge of, for example the manager of your favourite football team;

your manager at a part-time job; your tutor. How does what they do fit in with

Fayols list?




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Robert Katz stated that managers need three groups of skills to carry out such

tasks:

1 Technical

2 Human

3 Conceptual

Technical skills refer to the ability to use tools for the job, e.g. theability to use a spreadsheet for budgeting.

Human skills refer to interpersonal skills, which are of paramount importance in

people management.

Conceptual skills refer to the ability to see the big picture and understand theimpact one factor might have on another.

Below, Richard Branson illustrates how human and conceptual skills are key to the

success of Virgin.

Make all staff part of the management team

Virgin pays some of the lowest salaries in the industry, yet its staff are very

talented and loyal paradox? The companys success in this field is down to Sir

Richard Bransons management philosophy, where all staff feel valued andBranson is just as interested in a flight stewardesss opinion as he is in his

Marketing Directors.

Successful people management is about inclusion, and Branson works on making

all his staff feel like a team where each is valued not only for fulfilling their job

remit but for contributing to the development of the business as a whole.

Adapted from The Virgin Factor (May 2000), The Management Insights

Henry Mintzberg

In the 1970s Henry Mintzberg observed five chief executives at work in five

different American companies: a major consulting firm; a well-known teaching

hospital; a school system; a high technology firm; and a manufacturer of consumer

goods. He used a stop-watch to observe, in the course of one intensive week, the

activities of all five chief executives. He claims that if you ask a manager what he

does he describes it in Fayols terms, i.e. planning, organising, commanding, co-

ordinating and controlling. However, if you watch him in practice it is quite

different; for example, how would you categorise presenting a retiring employee

with a gold watch?

From his observations, Mintzberg identified ten roles that managers fulfil. He




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argued that everything a manager does fits into one or more of these ten roles

(some activities cover several roles at the same time).

He divided the ten roles into three main categories: interpersonal roles;

informational roles and decisional roles:

Interpersonal roles (related to dealing with people):

Figurehead performs symbolic duties of a legal or social nature, e.g. being

present at a trade delegation.

Leader covers all activities connected with managing staff, e.g. conducting

appraisals; allocating work to staff.

Liaison maintains a self-developed network of contacts who provide

information, advice, help, etc., e.g. co-ordinating with people in other

departments.

Informational roles (connected with handling information):

Monitor receiving information from internal and external sources, e.g.

checking weekly production figures.

Disseminator interpreting and transmitting information to members of the

organisation, e.g. writing monthly production report for management meetings.

Spokesperson transmitting information on the organisation to outsiders, e.g.

speaking to customers.

Decisional roles (about making different kinds of decisions):

Entrepreneur finding opportunities, inside and outside the organisation, tobring about improved organisational performance, e.g. designing a productivity

improvement scheme.

Disturbance handler taking corrective action to handle an issue which has

arisen unexpectedly, e.g. resolving an argument with another department.

Resource allocator allocating organisational resources, e.g. deciding on

staffing levels.

Negotiator conducting negotiation with outsiders, e.g. making an agreement

with a supplier.

In summary, Mintzberg argues that managers do a mixture of all ten roles.

Different jobs will have different mixes of roles and jobs may vary betweenorganisations. An operations manager in a manufacturing plant whose job

involves meeting tight production targets may spend much time doing the leader,

monitor, disseminator and disturbance handler roles. A marketing manager in a

services company, on the other hand, may spend most time on liaison, the three

informational roles and resource allocator.

Mintzbergs work confirmed that managers in modern organisations work at an

unrelenting pace.

They spend much of the day on many small tasks (50% of the managers in

Mintzbergs study engaged in tasks lasting less than nine minutes and only 10%




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exceeded one hour). The work is also categorised by variety and discontinuity.

Chief executives tend to be very action orientated and to dislike reflective

activities. There are also a number of regular duties to perform, such as attending

ceremonies and dinners. Managers tend to favour telephone calls and meetings

(oral communication) to emails and reports (written information). In two British

studies for example, 66% and 80% of managerial time (respectively) was spent in

oral communication.

Activity

Try to apply Mintzbergs managerial roles to the work of the same manager that

you used in the previous activity on Fayol. How well does what they do fit in with

Mintzbergs ideas? Does one model give a clearer picture of what managers do

than the other? If so, why?

Peter Drucker

Management by Objectives (MBO) was proposed by Peter Drucker in 1954 and is

still used by businesses today. He suggested that businesses should decide upon

organisational objectives, which are then broken down into departmental, and then

down to individual employee objectives. With employees involved in this process,

motivation is said to improve. Managers should then decide what work needs to bedone, and by whom, communicate this to employees, analyse actual vs planned

performance and finally bring out the talent in people. Managers are responsible

for:

setting objectives

organising the work

motivating employees

job measurement

people development.

Drucker argues that every manager, whether good or bad at the job, must carryout all of the above functions.

Rosemary Stewart

Rosemary Stewart (1983) describes the managers job as being made up of

constraints,choices and demands, and she argues that jobs are about doing

what you have to do (meeting demands), and deciding what to do out of the

options available to a manager (making choices). There are also internal and

external factors that can limit what a manager can do (constraints).




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The shape of the job

This illustrates how demands, choices and constraints can vary between jobs.

Differences in the demands, choices and constraints in two managerial jobs

Demands include: minimum criteria of performance procedures that cannot

be ignored

Choices include: how the work is done and what work is done

Constraints include: resource limitations, physical location attitudes and

expectations of others

Stewart, R, (1983) Choices for the Manager, McGraw-Hill

Activity

Apply Stewarts model to the same managerial job you used in the earlier activities

on Fayol and Mintzberg. Which of the three gives you the most helpful picture of

what managers do or are all three just different?




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Conclusion

This section gives an overview of what managers do and the important role theyhave to play within organisations. Fayol suggests that there are five functions of

management planning, organising, controlling,co-ordinating and commanding,

while Mintzberg states that all managers are involved in the roles of leading,

administering and fixing. Drucker and Stewart are also useful in studying what

managers do and what roles they perform.

Finally, the role of a manager is very much dependent upon a wide range of factors

such as the organisation in which they work, that is its culture and objectives. The

models we have just looked at can help to analyse what managers actually do.

They suggest that management will always be about planning, handling

information, making choices, etc. However, the context within which managers

work does change. We can conclude this section by listing some of the factors

which have affected the way in which managers do their jobs in recent years:

Management jobs are becoming more important in service sectors such as

health and education

Constant change in the workplace has resulted in a greater emphasis on the

leadership aspect of management

New working patterns such as home working (often prompted by developments

in ICT) pose new challenges for managers

Many organisations have embraced team working which may influence the

style adopted by managers.




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Section 2: Management theory

Management theory attempts to discover and develop models that may be used in

order to understand the process of management in organisations. Contributions to

its development have come from a range of disciplines such as sociology

(behaviour), social psychology (motivation, leadership), behavioural psychology

(motivation) and even statistics (management of production). These theories are

useful in explaining management style, and they include the Classical Theory ofpeople such as Henri Fayol (18411925). Other theories or models followed later,

such as Human Relations, Neo-Human Relations, Systems Theory and more

recently Contingency Theory.

The Classical School

This is called the classical approach because it was that taken by the first people to

write on management in the early years of the 20th century. They emphasised the

formal hierarchical organisation with clearly defined tasks and a common purpose.

Their view was that it was possible to find the one best way of doing things. For

example, bureaucracy was seen as the best form of organisation. We have already

seen how Fayol regarded his five elements of management as the best way to set

about the tasks of managing. Although this work has been in existence for some

time, it still influences the way that organisations think about management.

A key concern of writers from the classical school was increasing productivity.

The most important work in this area was by Frederick Taylor (18561915), the

founder of the movement known as Scientific Management. He suggested that

there was a best way to perform work tasks and that all workers wanted was a

fair days work for a fair days pay.

The principal objective of management should be to secure the maximum

prosperity for the employer, coupled with the maximum prosperity for the

employee.

F W Taylor

For the employer this means large profits in the short term but also development of

the enterprise in the long term. For the employees it means higher wages

immediately but also long-term development so they can perform efficiently.




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Taylor wanted to achieve:

1. efficiency (increased output per worker) to reduce under-working and offerthe best rate of pay through division of labour

2. standardisation of job performance, by dividing tasks up into small,

specified tasks

3. discipline, by establishing hierarchical authority and introducing a system

whereby all management policy decisions could be implemented.

He proposed:

1. job planning to be carried out by managers, while jobs should be carried out

by workers

2. the scientific analysis of tasks and functions to find the one best way ofperforming each task

3. the use ofpiecemeal incentive pay systems, so that the more a worker

produced the more s/he was paid.

His view monetary reward for achieving targets is now thought to be much

too nave, assuming money was the only reason why people worked. The system

may work forsomeindividuals but it cannot easily be applied to a group.Taylors view reduces workers to efficient functioning machines, and ignores

their social and psychological needs. Taylor removed the thinking, planning and

ordering from the shop-floor workers as he saw this as a function of management.

However, his findings regarding analysis of the best way to do each job are stillused today.

SAQ 2

How are the ideas of F W Taylor still used today?




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The Human Relations School

The classical school, particularly Scientific Management, was criticised fortreating people like machines and ignoring the influence that social factors can

have at work. This led to a new way of looking at management, known as the

Human Relations school. Elton Mayo (18801949), an Australian industrial

psychologist, is the founder of the Human Relations movement. Mayo and his

team, in conjunction with the management and employees, conducted research at

the Western Electric Company in Hawthorne, Chicago from 1927 to 1932. They

were asked to investigate the reason for low productivity at the factory.

One place in which Mayo and his colleagues conducted experiments was the relay

test assembly room. The work consisted of assembling telephone relay units,

which involved putting together a small number of components on a jig and

fastening them with four screws. It was essentially a routine, repetitive task thattook about a minute to complete. All the workers were women and were paid on a

piece basis (their pay was determined by the amount that each individual

produced).

Five assemblers and a layout operator, all women, were segregated away from the

main production area. All the materials needed for work were brought to them. An

observer supervised the workers and maintained a friendly atmosphere, consulted

with the workers and listened to their complaints. The observer was, in fact, a

social scientist and member of the research team.

During the experiments the following changes in working conditions wereintroduced.

1. All six workers were treated as a single group for the purposes of calculating

piecework.

2. Standardised rest periods of 15 minutes in the morning and 10 minutes in the

afternoon were introduced and a snack was provided by the company.

3. Working hours were reduced either by stopping earlier in the afternoon or

by not coming in on a Saturday morning.

The researchers compared the output of the workers before and after becoming

part of the group. Output was higher when they were part of the group and didnot seem to be influenced by the physical conditions at work.

Mayo and his team found the same thing when they altered other aspects of

working conditions such as the lighting. Productivity rose but this was not

apparently due to changes in physical working conditions. The factors that did

affect productivity were:

the social interaction and group norms established by the girls in the group

the friendly atmosphere where the views of the girls were listened to

the group felt important because the observer and others were paying attention.




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SAQ 3

Can you think of any problems with this research?

Mayo and his colleagues concluded that work satisfaction depended to a large

extent on the informal social pattern of the work group. Where norms of co-

operation and high output were established because of a feeling of importance,

physical conditions or financial incentives to motivate workers had little impact.

People will formworkgroups and this can be used by management to benefit the

organisation.

Workers, Mayo argued, were activated by a logic of sentiment, and managementby a logic of cost and efficiency. Conflict was inevitable unless the difference

was understood and allowed for.

This enabled the researchers to make certain deductions about how managers

should behave.

Management succeeds or fails in proportion as it is accepted by the group as

authority and leader.

Elton Mayo

In summary, the main conclusions from the Hawthorne experiments are:

1. Individual workers cannot be treated in isolation, but must be seen as

members of a group.

2. Monetary incentives and good working conditions are less important to the

individual than the need to belong to a group.

3. Informal or unofficial groups formed at work have a strong influence on the

behaviour of those workers in the group.

4. Managers must be aware of these social needs and cater for them to ensure

that employees collaborate with the official organisation rather than work

against it.

The basis of the Human Relations movement is the use of social sciences to

secure the commitment of individuals to the aims and activities of the

organisation. While this is seen as too simplistic today, it did establish the

importance of social factors in the organisational context.

SAQ 4

How does the Human Relations school differ from scientific management?




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The Neo-Human Relations School

While the Hawthorne experiments were significant in highlighting the importanceof the social aspects within an organisation, Mayos work still did not show how

work practices and organisational structure should be modified in order to improve

worker satisfaction and improve productivity. During the late 1940s it was realised

that the links between organisational design, motivation and productivity were a

lot more complex than first thought. These new ideas were known as the Neo-

Human Relations school. Writers in this school took a more psychological

orientation and looked at issues of motivation to work, group membership and

leadership style.

McGregor

Douglas McGregor was a leading member of this school. In 1960 he published his

work on Theory X and Theory Y.

Theory X that management must lead and motivate/manipulate inherently lazy

and passive workers (a view similar to F W Taylors). The assumption here is

that workers are indifferent to the organisation and will resist change, and that

managers need to lead and control them.

Theory Y that management must create the right conditions, and that people will

prove eager to respond to increased responsibilities, becoming more productive as

a consequence. The assumption here is that people are notnaturally passive andresistant to change, but that they are responsible. Management should provide the

right environment for employees to achieve their own objectives whilst striving fororganisational objectives. There should be more self-management and upward

communications along with participation in the decision-making process.

McGregor believed that Theory Y would lead to higher motivation. He considered

conventional assumptions (Theory X) to be both limited and unrealistic because

they relied on authority as the primary means of control, which he saw as likely to

generate resistance, restriction of output, indifference to organisational objectives

and a refusal to accept personal responsibility. McGregor recognised that much of

the behaviour in organisations did reflect the Theory X view.

However, he believed that this type of behaviour was not a consequence of the

inherent nature of staff but a product of the way in which staff were being treated

by organisations.

McGregor has highlighted that if managers believe that all their staff want is

more money and/or greater social satisfaction, they will therefore only provide

for these basic needs to be met. If managers do not accept that staff have more

complex needs, they will not be providing opportunities at work for the staff to

satisfy them. The result may well be frustration and a lack of commitment on the

part of the staff.

McGregors work is closely related to that of Maslow and Herzberg which will

be covered later.




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McGregors theory has been applied successfully through the modern Japanese

approach, Total Quality Management (TQM), which is based upon his Theory Yand is widely implemented throughout the world. The Neo-Human Relations

approach as a whole drew attention to issues such as job satisfaction,

participation, leadership style, all of which remain important in management

today.

Systems Theory

We have seen that the classical approach to management looked at the structure

and processes of an organisation and how it could operate more efficiently but

rather ignored the attitudes of those working in the organisation. On the otherhand, the Human Relations school focused on the people in organisations but

neglected the technical aspects of an organisation. The Neo-Human Relations

school addressed some of the problems of reconciling people and organisations

but tended to do so from an individual, psychological perspective rather than an

overall organisational view. All these approaches are rather narrow and do not

look at the organisation as a whole and all the various factors that may influence

how it operates. Systems Theory is an attempt to address this problem. It also

began in the 1940s but came to prominence in the 1960s and 1970s.

Systems Theory argues that in any organisation, the multitude of parts and

processes are so interrelated and so interdependent that a small change in one part

necessitates changes and adaptations in other parts. Often called the open-systemsapproach, it views any one organisation as an interdependent piece of a much

larger whole, looking outside to the environment in which the organisation

operates. This wider environment can include suppliers, customers and peer

organisations, all of which communicate on a regular basis with the organisation.

The environment as such then impacts upon organisational design and the

functioning of the organisation itself.

Organisational environment

INPUTS TRANSFORMATION PROCESS

OUTPUTS

Materials from supplier

Finished products

Equipment Satisfied

customers

Labour

Goods/services developed by organisation




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Activity

Using an organisation that you know, try to draw a transformation model like theone on the previous page. Try to be as precise as you can when you list the inputs

and outputs. If you cannot think of an organisation, use one like McDonalds. You

can find information about it from its website at http://www.mcdonalds.co.uk

The approach seeks to find the best fit from three elements:

1. technical factors (physical environment, equipment and technical processes)

2. social factors (social relations and attitudes within the group)

3. economic factors (measure of the efficiency of the technical and social mix).

As an open system it draws in resources from the environment, e.g. raw materials,

converting them into goods and services which are then fed back into the

environment, so it is a cyclical process. For example, Ford makes cars which it

sells to its customers for money. The money is recycled in the form of wages, tax

and the purchase of more raw materials.

This socio-technical approach to an organisation recognises that it is necessary to

incorporate both the social and technical aspects of work if an effective system is

to be created. This concept was developed by the Tavistock Institute of Human

Relations in the study of coal mining in the north-east of England. Prior to the

introduction of new technology to coal mining, teams of men worked closely

together, with each member of the team being highly dependent upon the others towork effectively and earn a decent wage. With new technology such as mechanical

equipment, the teams were broken up, resulting in deterioration in many areas, e.g.

industrial disputes, numbers of accidents, absence levels, etc. The problem was

solved by building teams back into the work to encourage interdependence among

workers.

Contingency Theory

This approach to management theory is a product of more recent times and can be

seen as a development of the systems approach. It is based on the assumption thatthere is no single approach to organisational structure that will suit all

organisations at any point in time. Both the classical management theories and

those based on human relations sought to offer this panacea. Contingency means

it depends. Organisations consist not only oftasks to be performed, but also

people to perform them, both in the same environment. The tasks need to be

carried out while people try to grow and develop. Contingency Theory tries to get

the best fit between task, people and environment. It draws on earlier approaches

(above) and stresses three factors:

the strengths and weaknesses of the organisation

the objectives of the organisation


http://www.mcdonalds.co.uk/http://www.mcdonalds.co.uk/


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the external environment of the organisation.

The problem for managers is to develop an approach which best suits a particularsituation. For example, with respect to structure it would be to design an

organisational structure that best suits the environment in which the organisation

operates. In this case, contingency implies that within the same organisation there

may be units of bureaucracy, units operating in a matrix structure and units which

are divisionalised. The only criteria for good design are task performance and

individual/group satisfaction. The Contingency Theory of management can be

applied to all aspects of management, e.g. leadership.

Conclusion

In summary, there is no single unifying theory of management. The discussion ofthe five approaches above demonstrates that ideas on management change and

develop over time. These approaches (and others not considered here) both reflect

management practice and influence the way managers behave. This is why they are

important. However, management is also influenced by other factors such as the

social and economic environment and by technological change. We go on to look

at particular aspects of the work of managers starting with motivation. As you read

through these think about which of the approaches to management have influenced

the ideas that are considered.




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SAQ 5

Decide whether the following statements are True orFalse.

1. F W Taylor believed that workers were motivated by management meeting

their social and psychological needs.

2. Taylor was the founder of the movement known as Scientific Management

and his theory is still used today to determine the best way to do a job.

3. Elton Mayos initial investigation was to determine the effect of working

conditions on productivity.

4. Mayo concluded that the sole benefit of the forming of workgroups wouldbe to improve the social life of workers.

5. McGregors Theory Y assumes that workers have little inclination to work

and need to be controlled and led by management.

6. The Systems Theory of management suggests that an organisation cannot be

viewed in isolation, but that changes in the internal and external

environment will impact on the functioning of the organisation itself.

7. Technical, social and economic factors are all considered by Systems

Theorists.

8. The Tavistock Institute of Human Relations found that new technology

improved efficiency and output.

9. The Contingency Theory of management recognises the importance of tasks,

people and the environment in managing organisations effectively.

10. Management practice is about choosing a theory and adhering to it

throughout your managerial life.




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Section 3: Motivation to work

Motivation is characterised by a certain level of willingness on the part of the individual

to increase effort. Since everyone is different we will all have different motivators.

Managers hope that by addressing motivation, performance will improve and

organisational goals will be achieved. Since a manager him/herself is judged by the

performance of their team, motivation is a crucial part of a managers job. There are

many theories of motivation but we shall look at two well known theories from Maslow

and Herzberg, both of whom were leading members of the Neo-Human Relations school.

Maslow

Abraham Maslow (1954) argued that people have five innate needs that can be placed in

a hierarchy/pyramid (starting at the bottom of the pyramid):

1. Physiological needs for sunlight, food, water, etc. things basic for human

survival

2. Safety needs for freedom from threat from the environment, animals and other

people, for shelter, security things essential to human existence

3. Social/love needs for relationships, affection, giving and receiving social

stimulus/love

4. Esteem needs for achievement, prestige, recognition

5. Self-actualisation needs for development of capability to the fullest potential.

People seek to satisfy these needs. As a result the needs become motivation for action.

When need at one level is partially met then the next level up will become a target. The

basic premise is that one moves to the next level of the hierarchy of needs upon

fulfilment of the current level, and that the current level ceases to become a motivator

once fulfilled. So, for example, you wouldnt worry unduly about self-esteem if you

hadnt eaten for a day and didnt know where the next meal was coming from.




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This model can be applied to motivation at work, e.g. the wish to do a good job or be

promoted could be related to an esteem need. In a work environment, managers cannot

provide the same rewards and expect increasingmotivation from staff. The higher orderneeds are considered to be more important for the modern employee.

SAQ6

Use the diagram above to fit the aspects of work given below into the appropriate level

of need:

Employee of the Year Award, wage/salary increase, works sports team, pension,

achieving career goal.

Herzberg

Maslows theory was based on meeting psychological needs. Frederick Herzbergs

approach to motivation looked at job satisfaction. His two factor theory (1966)

suggests that there are two types of factors which affect job satisfaction:

Motivators which result in job satisfaction, and include achievement, recognition,

responsibility, advancement, etc.

Hygiene factors which prevent dissatisfaction, and include company policy and

administration, supervision, interpersonal relationships, status, security and money.

The key point of Herzbergs theory is that these two factors have different effects on

job satisfaction and, therefore, on motivation. Satisfying hygiene factors will not lead

to a permanent increase in job satisfaction. Improving working conditions, for

example, will remove a source of dissatisfaction but will not positively motivate

workers. On the other hand, satisfying motivating factors will lead to an increase in

job satisfaction and to an improvement in motivation. Recognising the achievement of

workers, for instance, will increase job satisfaction and thus motivate workers.




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Management must, therefore, make sure that hygiene needs are satisfied, e.g. through

good working conditions, but also provide motivators in the form of opportunities for

advancement, responsibility, etc.

Methods to increase motivation to work

The theories of Maslow and Herzberg (and others) have had a great influence on how

managers attempt to improve motivation at work. Herzbergs theory has led to

approaches such as job enlargement and job enrichment, while Maslows ideas have

influenced many things from health and safety at work to the need to provide fulfilling

career opportunities for employees. Other theories have also been important. Scientific

management, for example, stressed the importance of monetary factors in motivation.

Contingency Theory suggests that the factors that are important in motivating workers

will depend on each particular situation. In this case, management should find out what

these factors are and use motivational methods which suit them.

Non-financial incentives

The Hawthorne studies showed that workers were motivated by non-monetary factors

and that jobs needed to be designed to take these factors into account. If jobs do not meet

peoples needs, then not only will workers not reach their potential, but the organisation

is likely to be affected by absenteeism and a lack of quality in work done.

Various methods were devised to try and put these principles into practice, including:

Job design

Job enlargement

Job rotation

Empowerment

Job enrichment

Group working

Quality circles.

The influence of management theorists, especially Maslow and Herzberg, is strongly

evident in many of these non-financial incentives which can be used by managers as

motivators.

Job design

The purpose of job design is to motivate the worker by stimulating his/her interest

and involvement. Job design decides:

which tasks and responsibilities should be taken on by particular workers

the methods, systems and procedures for carrying out the work

where accountability and authority lie.




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The Quality of Working Life (QWL) movement put forward five principles that

should be considered in the design of a job:

1. The principle of closure (a job should allow a worker to achieve the satisfaction

that s/he has completed a whole product or process well).

2. Control and monitoring of tasks (quality should be the responsibility of the worker

or team).

3. Task variety (increase the number or range of tasks available in order that workers

remain interested in their work).

4. Self-regulation (workers should have control over work methods as well as

sequence and speed of work).

5. Interaction and co-operation (social interaction should be allowed along with the

opportunity of working in a group).

Whilst job design can have many benefits, it is often difficult to implement in practice:

Employees may resent changes to their job and might not want extra duties.

Job design can be costly for an organisation to implement.

Technology can make job redesign more difficult.

Assessing whether job redesign has positively impacted productivity, etc. can be

difficult.

SAQ 7

How can Herzbergs theory be used to justify job design?

Job enlargement

This involves the merging of a number of simplified tasks of a similar nature in order to

provide an extended range of work. In effect it aims to increase the scope of the job. It

adds a wider range of similar duties to the job, seeking to motivate the worker by

reversing the process of specialisation. In this way unit tasks are regrouped rather than

seeking to improve the work itself. As a result of the broader range of tasks involved,

the perceived meaningfulness of the work is increased for the worker and s/he is more

likely to see the significance of the job in the broader organisation. For the employer,

however, it could reduce efficiency if the workers productivity is decreased as a result

of carrying out more tasks.

Job rotation

This involves rotating the jobs that workers do on a daily, weekly or monthly cycle. It

permits greater variety for individuals by moving them between jobs. This could mean

that unpleasant or monotonous jobs are shared and that certain workers are not

permanently allocated to them. Job rotation distributes existing work so workers are

moved around from job to job. For some workers this variety improves motivation, while

others might feel their job security threatened if workers become interchangeable. For

the organisation, job rotation has a number of implications:




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It provides increased flexibility in allowing workers to be moved around at short

notice.

Because workers must be trained in a number of tasks, it can be costly and in some

situations workers might claim higher pay because their skills have been enhanced.

If workers are carrying out multiple tasks they will be less skilful and probably

slower than if they were carrying out a single task.

Empowerment

The basis of empowerment is involving workers in decision making whether about the

direction of the organisation or about operational issues. It can mean giving workers

substantial responsibility, e.g. total discretion to offer refunds to customers. It provides

employees with a clearer view of the whole picture and their part in it. People are

recognised as an asset to the company and encouraged to fulfil their potential whilst at

work. The most common way of empowering employees is to encourage them to work

in teams and to relate the teams vision to the organisations.

Job enrichment

This involves the allocation of more interesting, challenging and perhaps more difficult

duties to workers in order to stimulate their sense of participation in achieving

objectives. It came out of work by Herzberg, who showed that such motivators could

bring about job satisfaction. An example might be in a manufacturing plant where a

production worker who carries out routine jobs is also asked to do machine maintenance,

machine setting or inspection. It might also be possible for such workers to be involved

in communicating with other departments or obtaining their own raw materials. Changes

like these can enhance workers skills and enable them to deal with complete tasks rather

than highly fragmented ones. So, instead of similar degraded tasks being grouped

together, genuine job enrichment provides new tasks for the worker that wouldpreviously have been carried out by supervisors or specialist workers. Workers respond

differently to job enrichment, but it has been found to be very successful in

administration and technical jobs.

Group working

There are great social and psychological gains to be obtained from co-operatively

working in teams (see Human Relations and Neo-Human Relations Schools of

Management on pages 769). Group tasks tend to be based on complete operations and

involve greater complexity and variety than fragmented ones. Groups can be self-

regulating, which reduces the need for supervision and increases individual members

feelings of control. It can be beneficial for the group to arrange job rotation and the fair

allocation of tasks among themselves.




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Quality circles

Quality circles can play an important part in shaping peoples experience of work. Here,

workers from the same area meet voluntarily to discuss, analyse and solve their own

work-related problems. Their solutions are presented to management and the group are

normally responsible for implementing and monitoring any changes they have

suggested. For quality circles to be successful:

businesses must want to have worker participation and decision making

workers need to support the scheme

the members need to be trained in problem solving, communication and team working

workers must feel that their views are valued within the circle.

The use of many of these non-financial motivators is demonstrated by Toyota, the car

manufacturer, in the following article.

Toyota: still winning the productivity game

The genesis or source of the Toyota production philosophy is Japanese culture and the

historic management/labour/supplier relationships that have evolved from it. This

philosophy has developed over a long period of time and is based on a number of

important beliefs:

Management, labour and suppliers should all share responsibility for sustained

improvement in Toyotas production plants. With positive results, all stakeholders

benefit.

A workforce with good morale and job satisfaction is more likely to produce quality

products at competitive prices. Toyota has effectively institutionalised many

successful workforce practices including the following:

cross-skilled training for flexible production

on-the-job training and job rotation for all assembly line workers

participation of all employees in programmes specifically designed to focus on the

dynamics of work team development

the establishment of the basic principle that all workers should think of

themselves in certain respects as managers, especially with respect to their

immediate work environment, rather than viewing themselves primarily as

mechanical machine operators.

The maximum number of tasks and responsibilities should be transferred to thoseemployees who actually add value to the car on the line.

A system needs to be developed that traces defects to their ultimate cause and

resolves these problems at source. Toyota believes that employee morale starts with a

safe workplace. Their managers back up their slogans and meetings with a Safety

First War Room designed to respond proactively to all safety issues.

They show each employee how each job on the assembly line relates to the other jobs in

the team module, and how the module is related to the assembly line as a whole.

They believe that the only way to make improvement a continuous process is to establish

a creative thinking group of employees/suppliers who are constantly seeking new ideas

from which to make improvements, so every employee/supplier is expected to work with




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theirhead as well as theirhands.

They assign responsibility for operational results to a work team with a strong team

leader. The team engages in collective work that requires joint efforts and generatespositive energy.

The result is a highly motivated workforce achieving high levels of productivity.

Adapted from Vaghefi, R; Woods, L and Huellmantel, A (2000), Toyota Story 2: Still

Winning the Productivity Game,Business Strategy Review, Vol. 11, Issue 1, pp.5970

Financial incentives

Many management theorists play down the impact that financial incentives on their own

have on employees, although the school of scientific management, including thinkers

such as Taylor, are keen proponents of motivating factors that satisfy economic needs.

Since managers are responsible for the performance of their teams, a core part of their

function is to motivate employees to perform. There are many ways of financially

rewarding employees in order to motivate them to achieve objectives. Financial

incentives used by managers may include the following:

Profit sharing/share ownership

Employees can be paid a cash bonus as a proportion of the companys annual profits.

This is not widely used in practice as payments are seldom linked to individual

performance.

The use of employee share ownership schemes, however, is quite widespread. Here,

the company buys shares on behalf of its employees from its annual profit. While this

can be expensive to set up and operate, it has been shown to have a positive impact

upon employee motivation.

This kind of incentive is obviously more appropriate in the private rather than in the

public sector.

SAQ 8

How can share ownership schemes improve motivation?

Performance-related pay (PRP)

PRP schemes link employees annual salary to their performance in the job. This is

widely used in white-collar jobs in both the public and private sector. It is based on an

individuals performance, so employees are paid more if they achieve more. However,

each employees performance targets must be clear in order that they can measured,

otherwise the whole scheme falls into disrepute.




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The size of the financial benefit can play an important part in how much PRP acts as a

real employee motivator. (Herzbergs motivating vs hygiene factors highlight this.)

Unless the financial reward is of some significance, motivation and job satisfaction

will not improve.

The move towards PRP is part of a general shift in the last decade to pay flexibility in

the UK, which often includes other financial incentives, such as the profit-sharing

schemes described above.

Bonus schemes

Bonus schemes are applicable to individual workers, groups of workers or the

organisation as a whole. Bonuses are normally one-off payments to motivate workers. In

a sales environment, for example, a salesperson could be encouraged by a bonus to sell a

specified number of cars by the end of the financial year, or a sales department could be

rewarded for achieving the lowest cost of sales for a particular product. A group bonus

scheme can be used to encourage people to work as a team.

Bonus schemes can be a very good incentive unless they become so regular that they

are expected by the employees and come to be seen as part of their basic pay. However,

there is an underlying problem with group or organisational schemes as some

employees who work hard will have their reward reduced because of others who do not

and this can be a disincentive. Bonus schemes in the public sector are often for nominal

amounts of money which obviously are not key motivators, but sizeable bonuses in the

private sector are not uncommon.

Problems with financial incentive schemes

While financial incentive schemes can be very successfully implemented, there can

be a number of problems with them:

Operating problems can affect a workers productivity. It might be outside the

workers control that raw materials were not available for them to do their job, yet

they would be negatively affected by this.

Quality can be adversely affected by workers taking shortcuts in order to achieve

targets.

In order that workers remain motivated, new financial incentives have to be

introduced regularly. This can be confusing to the worker who doesnt understand at

any given time what he needs to do to earn his bonus.

Quality of working life can be adversely affected by tight control, routines and

repetition.




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SAQ 9

Fill in the missing words:

1. Herzberg, like Maslow, belonged to the ______________________ school of

management.

2. Herzberg divided work into two factors which he called

______________________ and ______________________ factors.

3. Those factors which are to do with job content and which bring job satisfaction

are the ______________________.

4. Those factors which are to do with job context and are responsible for job

dissatisfaction are the ______________________ factors.

5. Where a job cannot be enlarged, another method of providing change from routine

(and sometimes also the opportunity to learn new skills) is job

______________________.

Conclusion

The value of financial and non-financial incentive schemes is rightly an important

debate, where it is accepted that no single policy will be applicable to allemployees inevery situation. The following article discusses some current issues in this area, raising anumber of challenges for managers in todays organisations.




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Financial incentives

Research into individual performance-related pay (IPRP) in the UK over the past decade

has failed to show that such systems have an effect on performance.

The whole idea of linking pay to performance is based on two questionable assumptions.

First, it perpetuates the illusion that companies are rational, top-down, directed

organisations and that managers have the foresight to know what to do in the

forthcoming year. This is the myth of the all-seeing boss. In reality, change is quicker

and messier than that. Second, and even more worrying, is the belief that people need

incentives to get them to behave in an acceptable way. Employees cannot be trusted, it

seems. Economists have a lot to answer for with their assumptions that people will be

lazy and self-seeking with guile unless there is a reward carrot (or the stick ofunemployment) available. This is the foundation for most economic theories of reward.

They never change, despite all the evidence that employees place much more value on

non-financial satisfaction and the rewards of a job well done.

In recent years, emphasis has been placed on the bundle of HR policies that help to

drive organisational performance. These typically include job enlargement, greater

employee discretion, involvement, relative autonomy and training and development.

Combined, these things are linked to improved performance.

The real problem is that managers continue to introduce pay systems as a single-issue

initiative, expecting the new pay system to alter behaviour and bring about cultural

change. It doesnt, unless supportive behaviour is already in place. By themselves, pay

systems do not change organisational culture.

Towers Perrins latest study (1999) of reward management in 460 organisations across

Europe found that 94% had made significant changes in the past three years, and 96%

planned further interventions. They are using rewards to reinforce the achievement of

business goals and aligning pay systems with the needs of their changing organisations.

This means a less hierarchical and more customer-orientated approach, team-based and

focused on contributions. New ideas are being tried be it sharing all your takings in a

day with employees, as Ikea did recently, or introducing broad-based share options for

employees, as Asda has done. Companies are looking for competitive advantage through

their people. As well as considering business strategy, organisational capabilities and

long-term goals when we plan and execute our strategic reward interventions, we need to

place at least as much weight on employees needs and values and the realities of

organisational life in the short term. All levels of staff and management should beinvolved in this process. Thats the route to trust, motivation and commitment to reward.

Once changes are made, focus on their operating effectiveness and continue to monitor

and improve them against their original goals. Think about how the buy-in and genuine

sense of involvement of all employees can be enhanced.

Adapted from Purcell, J (3 Feb 2000), Pay per view,People Management




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J D Wetherspoon

The company believes in creating a highly committed and motivated workforce made upof people who achieve personal fulfilment through the freedom to act given to them in

their daily work. The company sees its workforce as a prime organisational asset that is

motivated through a positive organisation culture, pay and benefits, as well as training

and development.

J D Wetherspoon recognises that many of its employees will not stay with it for all their

working lives, but it wants its employees to develop a sense of loyalty. It pays a rate

above that of its competitors, in the belief that employees are more likely to be motivated

when they know they are being paid more than the minimum required. The company also

bases its pay on reviews of performance, so that the higher pay reflects its positive view

of the worth of its employees.

The company does well at keeping its employees. It feels that its good rates of pay and

proper treatment of its workforce are major contributors to this success, which reduces

ongoing training costs and also creates a body of committed people.

The company has a bonus scheme. All staff receive a bonus, dependent on the

performance of the pub where they work. The company also runs a number of incentive

schemes, e.g. a monthly draw for examples of excellent customer care, with a paid

holiday for two in New York for the winner.

The company also operates a share option scheme enabling employees to buy shares at a

guaranteed price. By holding shares in the company, employees are likely to feel a

greater sense of belonging and will want to see the company do well.Wetherspoons training and development programme is a combination of on the job and

off the job training courses. Wetherspoons training focuses on career progression and

links training to national qualifications.

Extract from the J D Wetherspoon case study on http://www.thetimes100.co.uk

Activity

Visit the Times 100 website and look at J D Wetherspoon in more detail.


http://www.thetimes100.co.uk/http://www.thetimes100.co.uk/


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Motivation Wordsearch

T J O E Y G N I R A H S T I F O R P D M S T

W P X K I S O C I A L N E E D S S L M J E CO Y Z R C R E H P O T S I R H C D S O S I E

F E R O O H E R E M P O W E R M E N T T M F

A L S W C L Q K I B M A B Y W X E O I A A F

C S E F O U R R O L Y A T A Y L N I V R J E

T I L O S A L P O P L I E E P K F T A R T E

O A F T P E V T W M L L A P R C O I T A N N

R P A I K R L O U I Y C T H N A Y D O G O R

T N C N N M L F B R H O U J L B H N R I I O

H O T U A S A I C I E M O E P D C O T R T H

E I U S A M S Y E H A B X I L E R C E L A TO S A M Y N K V O N E N E G I E A K A S C W

R I L O O I E B R N E C U R O F R R M M I A

Y V I P S M Z E R V E H K E S B E O W R N H

Y R S S E R L I E R E V Y I D Z I W O O U N

Y E A N E A C R A R U E T E N A H R R N M O

R P T H T H M T Z Y V A O C N G W G K P M S

A U I I M I E B A I S T T H E O X N I U O L

L S O E N A E M L B V N A M C I M O N O C E

A N N D U R E C O G N I T I O N R Z G R E N

S T T Q G K R J U M P E R S D E N E I G Y H

Hidden in the above grid are 32 motivation terms. They run vertically, horizontally or

diagonally, backwards or forwards. How many can you find?

You should be able to find the following:

ACHIEVEMENT HERZBERG MONEY SELF-CHECKING

COMMUNICATION HIERARCHY OF NEEDS MOTIVATOR SOCIAL NEEDS

CULTURE HUMAN RELATIONS PIECE RATE SUPERVISION

ECONOMIC MAN HYGIENE PROFIT SHARING TAYLOR

EMPOWERMENT JOB ENRICHMENT RECOGNITION TEAMWORKING

FEEDBACK JOB SATISFACTION RESPONSIBILITY TWO-FACTOR THEORY

GROUP NORMS MASLOW SALARY UNIT OF WORK

HAWTHORNE EFFECT MAYO SELF-ACTUALISATION WORK CONDITIONS




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MOTIVATION TO WORK

Semco

Semco is a Brazilian manufacturing company run by Ricardo Semler. It has gained a

reputation for unusual management methods. Below are two extracts from a bookletgiven to every Semco employee.

Working hours

Semco has flexible working hours and the responsibility for setting and keeping track of

them rests with each employee. People work at different speeds and differ in their

performance depending on the time of day. Semco does its best to adapt to each persons

desires and needs.

Working environment

We want all our people to feel free to change and adapt their working area as they please.

The company has no rules about this and doesnt want to have any. Change the area

around you, according to your tastes and desires and those of the people who work with

you.

Adapted from Semler, R, Maverick, Arrow Books

SAQ 10

1 How do you think the above policies are intended to increase motivation?

2 Do you think financial incentives will work in a situation like this?




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TEAMS

(d) audience in a theatre

(e) people sheltering from the rain in a shop doorway

Individuals may behave differently when working on their own than they would if

they were working as part of a team. Group pressure can influence the team

member to act differently in order that team goals are achieved. The person is

influenced to conform to thegroup norm, i.e. a shared perception of how thingsshould be done, or a common attitude, feeling or belief. The Hawthorne

experiments considered earlier, along with many others, show how group

behaviour can influence workers motivation, so it is useful to study how groups

form and how they can be effective parts of an organisation.

SAQ 12

1. What do you think could be the organisational benefits of team working?

2. Explain the differences between formal and informal groups.

3. What is a group norm? What significance do group norms have for group

bonding?

Group development

Groups do not become effective teams immediately. There are many factors that

encourage group formation, including:

physical proximity, e.g. students sitting near each other in a classroom

rewards attached to mixing with others, e.g. being able to work faster and more

efficiently

emotional support, e.g. in times of crisis other group members might provide

support

clear objectives set for the group.

Tuckman (1965) describes a four-stage model of group development:

Forming: The forming or orientation stage is when team members learn abouteach other, about the nature and purpose of the group and the constraints within

which it must work. Group structures, status hierarchies and interaction between

team members are decided upon.

Storming: The confrontation or storming stage is when disputes and power

struggles arise. In this phase there is group conflict, criticism and open

questioning of the groups goals.

Norming: The differentiation or norming stage is when work is divided and

individual members responsibilities are tentatively implemented. Conflicts are

resolved and the group moves into a who does whatmode.




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Performing: The collaboration or performing stage is when group productivity

increases, when there is commitment within the group to success, and when

individuals are valued by their colleagues. Decision making is established within

the group and people get on with their work.

Characteristics of effective teams

A number of factors determine how effective teams can be effective in making

decisions:

team size

nature of the task

clarity of the task

team goals

team roles

communication between team members

group processes and procedures.

Team size

The size of a task can determine team size, e.g. if you had to brainstorm a number

of options to solve a problem, a team of thirty people would be ineffective.

Within a team there is a trade-off with regard to the team size. The more members

in the team, the more complex the communication process needed; however, the

broader range of experience can be brought to the table. On the other hand, the

larger the team, the smaller the contribution any individual can make. Other

issues when deciding team size include the need for rules and procedures, the

potential for a sub-group to dominate a larger team, and often the larger the group

the longer the decision-making cycle. Teams of more than a dozen tend to require

extensive supervision, and they encourage the emergence of sub-groups.

Nature of the task

The type of task to be carried out by the group should determine the type of group

that is formed. Large groups are unsuitable for problem solving, e.g. one of the

critical success factors of quality circles is a small group that encourages

discussion, creativity and problem solving. On the other hand, large groups arevery useful for the dissemination of information. While the individuals concerned

could work in different groups to carry out different tasks, it can be difficult to

work in a single group that is handling quite different tasks, for example,

allocating workandcreatively solving a problem. To overcome this issue, groupmeetings could be split by type of task to be undertaken rather than organising one

meeting to handle multiple and quite different tasks.

If the task has to be done urgently, a team may need to adopt a more structured

approach then if the task is less pressing. In these situations, getting the work

done is a key priority and the role of the team is to make sure that everyone

knows what has to be done and completes it as quickly as possible. A team which

operates in an environment where work has to be done quickly is likely to have




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clearly stated procedures and well-defined targets.

Clarity of the task

If tasks are clear and unambiguous, a group can operate in a more structuredway than if things are less clear. A precise task will help the group through the

forming and norming stages of group development.

However, not all tasks in a work environment can be defined precisely. There are

many occasions when the solution to an aspect of work is not known and it is left

to the group to develop a suitable solution, which at the outset is undefined.

Team goals

Team output is affected by two distinct elements the teams objectives and the

satisfaction level of the team members. Each team member must clearly

understand the teams work, and the role of each individual. Where team members

are unclear about what is required, teams are less likely to be effective.

Team roles

In the 1970s R Meredith Belbin and colleagues developed a theory that an

effective team requires a mix of complementary team roles. He argued that people

with different psychological characteristics adopt particular roles at work and that

combinations of different types of people were required to make a well-balanced

team. For a successful team, he argued, there were nine roles that required to be

filled, although they may not be needed in equal measure. The nine roles were:

Co-ordinator

This person is self-confident, mature, a good speaker and listener, good atfacilitating group decisions and an ideal chairperson. Perhaps not the cleverest or

most creative member of the team, but good at clarifying goals and promoting

decision making.

Supporter

This person is perceptive, able to identify problems and promotes harmony

within the group. S/he will tend to avoid confrontation and avoid making

decisions that may cause conflict.

Specialist

This person has specialist knowledge or skills that are needed by the team. Theytend to be single-minded and narrow in outlook.

Innovator

Unlikely to be a good communicator, this is an ideas person creative and animaginative problem solver. While intelligent, s/he is likely to be an introvert

and poor at communicating.

Shaper

The shaper is task-oriented, thrives on pressure and is likely to overcome

obstacles, albeit at the expense of other team members feelings. They enjoy

challenges and are dynamic and outgoing people. Other team members could

criticise this person for being manipulative and someone who avoids completing




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tasks.

Completer-finisher

This person is unlikely to delegate but is very conscientious and an unassertiveintrovert. They search out errors and omissions, scouring the small print in

order to be thorough.

Implementer

This person is capable of turning ideas into action and is very stable and practical.

They are disciplined but prone to being inflexible and need persuading of an ideas

validity before proceeding.

Monitor-evaluator

This person is a critic with the ability to analyse issues and is normally correct in

his/her assessments. They tend not to suggest new ideas but can identify the

options available and the strengths and weaknesses of them. They tend to lack

warmth and the ability to inspire others, but are stable and intelligent.

Resource investigator

This person works outwith the bounds of the group to gather new ideas and

information. They inspire everyone, spread the word and develop contacts. They

are normally very enthusiastic at the beginning but tend to lose interest as time

progresses. They are relaxed and positive but tend to be over-optimistic.

Belbin argued that a well-balanced team should include someone who fitted each

of the roles. The only exceptions are co-ordinator and shaper where either one or

the other was required. This does not mean that a team should have a minimum ofeight people as it is possible that some team members can play more than one role.




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This article shows how Belbins model can still be applied.

Teaming with talent

Even if you are happy to accept that the group effort is always better than

individuals working in isolation, how do you set about constructing a team when

your business is that of designing and selling computer software? Or if you are

reviving a failing school? Twenty years ago, Belbin began a decade of research at

the Henley Management Centre into team dynamics and discovered there is a

formula that works across business disciplines.

We would get a group of people together and ask them to self-select what they

considered to be the best team. They would invariably choose the best set of

individuals. We would then select the remnants according to the Belbin formula.

We would set them some tasks, and the Belbin-formula team would always win.Wipe the floor with the others.

The idea behind the Belbin method is to build jobs around people. Define a job

only by its core requirements, e.g. artists need to be able to draw, then using this

minimum specification, look at the person. For every business team to function it

will need the natural leader, the born organiser, the scatty creative. Or to use the

jargon, the co-ordinator, the shaper and the innovator. Even the sad anorak in

the corner of the office, the one incapable of seeing the wood for the trees, can

play a vital role in the Belbin team. They are the finishers, the ones who make

sure the task is seen through and completed, mainly by dint of worrying

themselves sick about it.

The winning team is out there, sitting opposite you or just round the corner. The

nag, the prat, the office bully each could play a part in turning your company

into a winning outfit. All you have to do is identify them.

Adapted from White, J (September 1999), Teaming with Talent, ManagementToday

The value of Belbins work lies in designing teams to achieve high performance.

In selecting people for team membership, senior management should ensure that a

proper mix of roles exists in the team. If existing teams are underperforming it isperhaps because one or other of the roles is not being fulfilled. To ensure the right

balance for the team it is necessary to collect information on the personality types

of the existing pool of employees from whom the team is drawn. Only by selecting

a balanced team will the team be effective. Teams are the basic building block of

successful organisations and Belbins work enables us to understand what makes a

successful team. Belbins approach is used in some form today, but it is criticised

for its subjectivity and the fact that it can be difficult to determine which team role

an individual actually plays in a team.




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Communication between team members

Good communication is essential for teams to work together successfully. Methods

of communication can be controlled both by the group members and their leader.

The main channels for communication between group members are shown below:

Circle system

Wheel system

All-channel system

Chain system

The circle system

Here messages pass between certain people who pass it on to others.

Matters requiring several comments and opinions are best handled through a

circle.

The wheel system

Here the person at the centre of the group can communicate with all members of

the group, but each individual member has to go through the central person in

order to communicate with others, e.g. a meeting that is managed by a chairperson.

Person 1

Since messages can be tra

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