PATTS REVIEW CENTER
WHAT IS MANAGEMENT AS APPLIED TO ENGINEERING?
Management is the process of setting and achieving objectives through the
execution of the basic management functions that utilize human, financial and
material resources, Thus Management By Objectives (MBO). This is the type of
Management applicable to Engineering.
Organization is a group of two or more persons that exists and operates to
achieve clearly stated commonly held objectives. Objectives are goals – target
to school for states of being or places to be reach through plans and finally
actions.
Managers – Engineers as Managers, those in positions of authority who make
decisions to commit their resources of others towards the achievement of the
objectives of an organization.
Management and managers make conscious decisions to set and achieve
objectives. Decision making is a critical part of all management activities.
Management is getting things done and the objectives achieves through people.
To achieve the objectives as set, managers must apply and execute the basic
functions of management, namely; Planning, Organizing, Directing, Supervising
and Controlling.
Financial, Human and Material Resources of Management – The 4 M’s of
Management.
1. Money – the financial resource of an organization which is its base and
foundation.
2. Manpower – the human resource of an organization through which
things are done or objectives are achieved.
3. Materials – those resource utilized by people to do things and achieve
the objectives of the organization.
4. Machines – those resources that help facilities to perform all activities
toward the achievement of the objectives.
Levels of Management – The Management Pyramid
Managers are divided into three basic categories: TOP MANAGEMENT, MIDDLE
MANAGEMENT and FIRST –LINE of SUPERVISORY MANAGEMENT.
THE TOP MANAGEMENT – It consists of the organization’s most important
manager.
- The Chief Executive Officer of the President and/or Chairman of the
Board, his immediate subordinates:
- The Executive Vice- President, the Senior Vice President and the Vice
President. Top Management is responsible for the overall management of
the organization. It establishes organizational or company wide
objectives and operating standards and policies; and directs the
organization in relationships with environment.
THE MIDDLE MANAGEMENT – Middle Managers are managers below the rank
of Vice –President but above the Supervisory level and their subordinates are
other managers below. They are responsible for implementing top
management policies.
THE FIRST LINE OR SUPERVISORY MANAGEMENT – First line managers or
supervisors, those at the operating level are the lowest level management.
Their subordinates are the workers, the group upon which management
depends for the execution of their plans. They are the ones in direct control
with the workers.
BASIC MANADGEMENT FUNCTIONS
All Managers share/in the execution of the management functions-Planning,
Organizing and Controlling.
The following are the basic management functions used to set and achieve the
objectives of the organization:
PLANNING – Planning is the “first function” that all managers engage because
it lays the ground work for all other functions. It identifies the objectives, their
achievements and alternatives. It maps out causes of action that will commit
individuals, decisions, departments and the entire organization for days,
months, and years to come. Planning achieves these ends, after setting in
motion the following processes; (1) Determination of what resources will be
needed, (2) Identification of the number and types of personnel the
organization will be needed, (3) Development of the foundation for the
organizational accomplished, and (4) Determination of a standard against
which the progress toward the objectives can be measured so that corrections
can be made if necessary.
The Length of time and the scope of planning vary according to the level in the
company. Top level management planning may cover a period of five years or
more and can be considered long-range planning. Lower levels planning may
have time frames of one year, but less than five years, short-range plannings
and strongly guided develops the structure to reach these objectives.
ORGANIZING – Organizing as a management function is concerned with (1)
Assembling the resources necessary to achieve the organizations objectives,
and (2) Establishing the activity –authority relationships of the organization.
Planning has established the objectives of the company and how they are to be
achieved; now organizing develops the structure to reach these objectives.
The activities necessary to achieve the objectives are grouped into working
divisions, departments or other identifiable units. Each units (and each person
in the unit) should have clearly defined authority, or a clearly defined list of
duties and are persons to whom to report.
DIRECTING – Directing is aimed at getting the members of the organization to
move in the direction that will achieve it objectives. Directing builds a climate,
provides leadership, and arranges the opportunity for motivation. This is done
be setting the standards, policies, rules and regulations the people will follow,
properly communicated and reinforced. Communications need to be on-going
and personalized and each individual should be encourage to participate in the
decision-making process.
SUPERVSING – After having located prospective workers to fill the jobs
created by the organizing process, supervising involves the process of
overseeing the performance of all the workers doing the activities in order to fit
the right people to the right job; and match job demands with the abilities of
the workers. It also involves the development and implementation of a system
for appraising the workers’ performance and providing feed back for
performances improvement. Supervising also involves training of people on the
job keep them qualified.
CONTROLLING – Controlling deals with establishing standards for performance,
measuring performances against established standards, and dealing with
deviations from established standards. If attempts to prevent problems, to
determine when problems do exist, and to solve the problems that occur as
quickly and effectively as possible . Controlling depends on accurate, reliable,
and enforceable standards and monitoring of performances by people,
machines and processes. The best control ensures that work is performed to
standards as planned.
MANAGEMENT SKILLS
As a manager plans, organizers, directs, supervises and controls in his or her
management job, he or she must have mastery of three basic skills. These
skills needed by all managers are TECHNICAL, HUMAN and CONCEPTUAL.
TECHNICAL SKILL – The knowledge of and ability to use processes, practices,
techniques, or tools of a specially responsibility area. Examples of the
technically skilled are engineers, accountants, doctors, sales persons and
qualify control specialist. The manager needs enough technical skill to
accomplish the job for which he or she is responsible.
HUMAN SKILL – The ability to interact with other persons successfully. A
manager must be able to understand, work with and relate to both individual
workers and groups or team in order to build a teamwork environment. The
proper execution of one’s human skill is referred as HUMAN RELATIONS.
CONCEPTUAL SKILL – The metal ability of a manager to view the organization
as a whole and to see how the parts or segments of the organizations relate to
and depend on one another. It deals with bright ideas and abstract
relationships. In addition, conceptual skill is the ability to imagine the
integration and coordination of all the segments of the entire organization, all
its processes, standards and systems in order that managers are capable of
planning wisely especially long-range planning.
These three skills are inter-related with each other, so that if a manager falls in
one skill, his success in his career will be greatly jeopardized.
EVALUATION OF MANAGEMENT PERFORMANCE
Knowing what a manager does and the skills needed to perform the job, the
question rises: How is that manager judged on his or her own performance? A
manager’s performance? A manager’s performance can be measured by two
criteria: EFFECTIVENESS and EFFICIENCY.
EFFECTIVENESS – is “Doing the right thing” which means that a manager has
the responsibility for selecting the right objectives and the appropriate means
for achieving that objectives. Thus, a manager needs to be able to select the
right decision from among many alternatives and then to select the right
method from any methods for implementing the decision.
EFFICIENCY – is measuring the cost of attaining a given objective and is
concerned with how resources (money, manpower, materials and machines are
used to get the desired results. If the minimum cost is spent to obtain the
desired objective, the manager is said to be efficient.
The manager’s responsibilities requires that he or she be both effective and
efficient. Efficiency is therefore important while effectiveness is vital in all
decision makings. The manager who makes the right choices and implements
the resources with least cost to attain the objectives is an asset to the
organization.
