Management theories

Essay text:

They: Looked at organisations in terms of group behaviour and team effort rather than individual performance Saw the role of management was to harmonise and coordinate the efforts of all people in the organisation Had a human relations view of management Had a leadership style that was more democratic and encouraged participation in decision-making by workers Supported a flatter organisational structure based on teams The political theorists contributed to our understanding of power and authority as it affected management interaction with the various stakeholder groups. They recognised that: The structure of a business as a coalition of stakeholders Groups of stakeholders have different views on the objectives of a business Managers have to identify strongly held views of stakeholders and consider them when they developed strategies The classical, behavioural and political approaches to management have their strengths and weaknesses: Classical treated people as machines although they significantly improved productivity at the time there are techniques, ignored by these theorists, that would further improve productivity, The Behavioural approach added to our understanding of the importance of leadership, motivation, communication and resolving conflict to improve productivity The political approach added to our understanding of power and authority in reconciling the different views of stakeholders The systems theorists recognised that a business should be seen as a system (a set of interrelated parts all operating together to achieve common goals)...