Overview of Managers-

All industries need management, and the managers who perform that function need to possess certain skills. Before we talk about those skills, though, it’s important to understand that the title of manager actually refers to three distinct groups of people within an organization: top-level or executive managers, middle managers, and first-line managers. Each level has a different area of managerial responsibility and reporting structure. 

The role of the manager in the workplace is perhaps the most significant in terms of impact on organizational performance. Managers have the most direct influence on employees they line manage. They carry the responsibility for aligning the performance of their department and its staff with overarching organizational goals. They play a vital role in shaping organizational culture.

• Set objectives– setting goals for the group, and determining how best to meet those
• Organize– divide work into manageable activities, and assign these to relevant team members
• Motivate and communicate– communicating decisions clearly and creating a team ethos amongst staff
• Measure– establish appropriate yardsticks and targets, and analyze and interpret performance
• Develop people– developing staff as company assets

A successful manager-

A good manager has all the skills and can implement those skills for running the organization properly & successfully.

5 managerial skills are-

1. Technical skills
2. Conceptual skills
3. Interpersonal skills & Communication skills
4. Decision-making skills.
5. Diagnostic and Analytical Skills.

Role of Management-

Management is the process of guiding the development, maintenance, and allocation of resources to attain organizational goals. Managers are the people in the organization responsible for developing and carrying out this management process. Management is dynamic by nature and evolves to meet needs and constraints in the organization’s internal and external environments. In a global marketplace where the rate of change is rapidly increasing, flexibility and adaptability are crucial to the managerial process.

This process is based in four key functional areas of the organization:

• Planning,
• Organizing
• Leading
• Controlling.

From this perspective, the managerial process can be described as

(1) Anticipating potential problems or opportunities and designing plans to deal with them,

(2) Coordinating and allocating the resources needed to implement plans,

(3) Guiding personnel through the implementation process

(4) Reviewing results and making any necessary changes.

This last stage provides information to be used in ongoing planning efforts, and thus the cycle starts over again. The four functions are highly interdependent, with managers often performing more than one of them at a time and each of them many times over the course of a normal workday.

Example from Industrial top notch brand Apple-

To encourage greater collaboration between employees, Apple is investing $5 billion in the construction of its new Cupertino, CA, headquarters, which is replacing several buildings the company had outgrown. Most headquarters-based employees of Apple now share not only the same office space, but also the same technology tools and corporate culture.

The four management functions can help managers increase organizational efficiency and effectiveness. Efficiency is using the least possible amount of resources to get work done, whereas effectiveness is the ability to produce a desired result. Managers need to be both efficient and effective in order to achieve organizational goals. For example in 2016, Delta, one of the most efficient network U.S. airlines, operated at revenue of 12.15 cents per seat-mile, which is the revenue the company makes on one seat (occupied or not) the distance of one mile. No other airline came close to operating this efficiently except Southwest, which flew seats that produced 12.51 cents a mile, the best performance of all U.S. airlines.

To meet the demands of rapid growth, Skechers hired a new chief financial officer, John Vandemore, which allowed their existing CFO (David Weinberg) to concentrate on international expansion. Skechers CEO Robert Greenberg commented: “As international now represents more than 50 percent of our total business, we must continue to ramp up operations and infrastructure to meet the demand. David (Weinberg) understands how to do it the right way at the right speed to maintain our forward momentum. With John (Vandemore) handling CFO responsibilities, David will now have the bandwidth to travel and find opportunities to maximize our efficiencies around the globe.”

Successful Quotes-

1) Stephen Covey

“Management is efficiency in climbing the ladder of success; leadership determines whether the ladder is leaning against the right wall”.

2) Lee Iacocca

“If I had to sum up in a word what makes a good manager, I’d say decisiveness. You can use the fanciest computers to gather the numbers, but in the end you have to set a timetable and act.”

3) Mike Huckabee

A leader is the one who can outline the broad vision and the direction and say, here’s where we are going to go, here’s why we need to go there, and here’s how we are going to get there. A manager is the one who actually gets up under the hood and tunes the carburetor.