LEADERSHIP AND MANAGEMENT

TOPIC 2: THE PARADOXES OF MANAGEMENT

Explain the research and thinking behind each of the classic approaches to management

1900 – 1925: The Rational Goal Model

The focus of the Rational Goal model was work organisation and efficiency. New managerial and organisational practices appeared. During this period, breakthroughs emerged in manufacturing efficiency through assembly lines and geographic expansion of companies in the United States, in which the modern divisionalised and dispersed organisation form emerged.

This approach is still prevalent today in many developing countries as routine and repetitive manufacturing and services work is moved from developed economies to lower HR costs and lesser regulated, emerging economies.

A major criticism of scientific management has been its focus on the worker as no more than an input to the mechanism of manufacturing or tasking. The organic aspect of workers as human beings and not cogs in the machine can frequently be left out of consideration in designing work under the Rational Goal model using Scientific Management.

1900 – 1925: The Internal Process Model

The Internal Process model of management is concerned with processes of responsibilities, measurement and orderly rules, structures and procedures. In 1916 Henri Fayol identified management as a universal set of functions encompassing: planning, organising, commanding, coordinating activities, and controlling performance.

The impact of Fayol’s concepts of managerial function still prevails today as many academic texts on management have their chapters structured around the broad headings of Planning, Leading, Organising, and Controlling which has been dubbed the Process Approach. Fayol described the practice of management as something distinct from other functions of business such as finance, accounting,