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| The profile of an effective managerp>Let’s now go back to the second aspect – creativity, and let’s see what it means: “Creativity – producing or using new and effective ideas, results, etc”[26]. When we think about creativity, we imagine people who are gifted, talented, and different from others, whose ideas, decisions, and actions are situated out of the every day’s life borders. In culture, creativity is associated with such a people like Bach, Van Gogh, and Einstein; in business with Steve Jobs (co-founder of Apple Computers), Jack Welch (General Electric), and Anita Rodick (The Body Shop).[27] Today creativity is a way of thinking, the way to integrate you visions and ideas into relationships and business. This process can be presented as following: Figure 3: Critical thinking Brainstorming processes Free association, etc.
The use of creativity in the decision making process or in problem solving allows manager to increase the effectiveness and encourage creative thinking among employees. An effective manager will use creativity as a tool of motivation. When employees are encouraged to use creativity in their problem solving and in everyday work, they are more likely to feel unique, valued and important for their organization[28]. In this way a manager can not only develop effectiveness but also create a group of like- minded employees. For an effective manager of the future creativity or creative thinking should become the natural way to think. But to reach this ideal situation each manager should avoid the following barriers: 1. “A negative value of fantasy and reflection as a waste of time, a sign of laziness, or even a bit crazy”[29] 2. the ideas that only children may play and fantasise but adults must be serious 3. the idea that problem solving is a very serious an responsible process and you must forget about creativity and humour 4. a negative image of feeling and intuition, which are regarded as illogical an impractical Although it is very difficult sometimes to change the society’s cultural barriers and to change the image of creativity, each manager should try to overcome pragmatic influences and think individually. 4. Developing of managerial knowledge and manager’s teaching role Every manager must be sure that he or she will develop the competence and knowledge of those they supervise. Every employee has a potential for personal and professional development, and a good manager should discover and develop this potential. We will start with the idea that each person wants to know more. When a young employee comes to the company he has a lot of theoretical knowledge, personal ideas and visions. He has read a lot of books and articles, but he is still asking himself a lot of different questions. In that moment he needs someone to teach him how to become successful. . Appreciate uniqueness of the people . Assess capability of their team members . Anticipate the future (leads others in the future) . Align aspirations (create win/win partnerships built on trust and loyalty) . Accelerate learning Some authors[34] say that as a manager and especially as an executive
manager you are responsible for all fields of business in your company: for
marketing and sales, for finance, for information technology etc. You
should understand how things works (the IKEA-case and Kamprad’s attention
to all details can illustrate this statement) and also how employees work
whose knowledge in one particular field are deeper then yours. These are
two main corner stones of success. How to reach them? The best solution can
be continuous replacing inside organization. As a result manager receives
variety of experiences and knowledge in different functions, business
units, companies, and even countries. The positive effect of such a Some other authors[36], especially from the business world, used to think that an effective manager must not be satisfied with his education degree and training, but must always be ready to catch advanced education opportunities. The advanced degree is MBA-program; if this level was reached then never avoid additional seminars, courses and workshops. In contrast to the thirst group of authors who are speaking about continuous replacement, these theories accept the idea of receiving deep knowledge in one particular area. These two approaches and also all theories about teaching show us how
important is for every manager to develop himself and his employees. 1 Motivation of employees Like the previous characteristics, the ability to motivate your employees to work is also an indispensable one if you want to be effective as a manager. The psychology of motivation is tremendously complex, and what has been unravelled so far with any degree of assurance is very small. What I will do here is (1) give a definition of what motivation is, (2) very briefly going across the major theories, classical and contemporary ones, and (3) address some possibilities how an affective manager can implement the ideas the theories offered in reality, which is of most importance. But first some theory. Stephen P. Robbins gives us the following definition of motivation in his book Organizational Behavior (2001, p. 155)[37]: “[…] the processes that account for an individual’s intensity, direction, and persistence of effort toward attaining a goal”. Thus intensity (1) is concerned with “how hard a person tries”, with direction (2) we mean “toward attaining the organizational goals“and persistence refers to “how long a person can maintain his or her effort”. In the past, especially in the 50’s, a lot has been written about how managers can motivate their employees. We can classify these theories in 5 categories.[38] These are:
- Hierarchy of Needs Theory (A. Maslow) / ERG Theory (C. Alderfer) - Two Factor Theory (F. Herzberg) - Theory X and Theory Y (D. McGregor) These theories all depart from the thought that to motivate your employees,
you have to satisfy certain needs. Maslow’s hierarchical model, a classical
one, says that you first have to satisfy physiological needs (i.e. hunger,
thirst, …), then you have to offer them safety (from physical and emotional
harm), consequently you must satisfy them socially (affection, acceptance, Maslow’s theory has received wide recognition, but unfortunately research
does not validate the theory. A theory that contests Maslow’s theory is Another classical need theory is the Theory X and Theory Y of Douglas Maybe the most important contribution to the motivation question comes from
the psychologist Frederick Herzberg with his Two-Factor Theory. The insight 2. Goal-Setting Theory (E. Locke): The primary idea of this theory is that specific and difficult goals, with goal/ feedback, lead to a higher performance. This means that, for example, to motivate someone, you don’t say “Just do your best”, but you say specific what has to be obtained, for example “You should strive for 85 percent or higher on all your work in English”. Research supports this theory in that this do can lead to a higher performance, although it may not lead to job satisfaction (cfr. supra). 3. Reinforcement Theory: This theory states that reinforcement conditions behaviour. Behaviour is thereby environmentally caused. What controls behaviour are reinforcers – any consequence that , when immediately following a response, increases the probability that the behaviour will be repeated. The theory ignores the inner state of the individual and concentrates solely on what happens to a person when he or she takes some action. Because it does not concern with what initiates behaviour, it is not, strictly speaking, a theory of motivation. But it does provide a powerful means of analysing of what controls behaviour, and it is for this reason that it is typically considered in discussions on motivation. 4. Equity Theory (J. S. Adams): This theory poses that individuals compare their job inputs (i.e. effort, experience …) and outcomes (i.e. salary, recognition …) with those of others and then respond so as to eliminate any inequities. For example a person who does the same job as another employee but gets paid less will be motivated to perform better in order to eliminate the existing inequities. 5. Expectancy Theory (V. Vroom): This is currently one of the most accepted explanations of motivation. Most of the research evidence is supportive of this theory. Concrete, this theory says that an employee will be motivated to exert a high level of effort when he or she believes that effort will lead to a good performance appraisal; that a good performance appraisal will lead to organizational rewards such as a bonus, a salary increase, or a promotion; and that the rewards will satisfy the employee’s goals. The major theories briefly presented, we can now look at how in reality a manager can implement these. Robbins mentions 6 applications. These are: 1. Management by objectives (MBO) (cfr. Goal-Setting Theory): This means in realty, as a manager, you make sure that the organization’s overall objectives are translated into specific objectives for each succeeding level (divisional, departmental, and individual) in the organization. You develop a program that encompasses specific goals, participatively set with the employees, for an explicit time period, with feedback on goal progress. MBO programs are used in many business, health care, educational, government and non-profit organizations. 2. Employee Recognition Programs (cfr. Reinforcement Theory) Consistent with reinforcement theory, rewarding a behaviour with
recognition immediately following that behaviour is likely to encourage its
repetition. For example: personally congratulating an employee, or sending
a letter or an e-mail, having a celebration because of good achievement, or
publicly recognizing, such as organizing a prize “Best Employee of the The idea here is that by involving workers in those decisions that affect them and by increasing their autonomy and control over their work lives, employees will become more motivated, more committed to the organization, more productive, and more satisfied with their jobs. Examples: - participative management: subordinates share a significant degree of decision-making power with their immediate superiors. - representative participation: rather than participate directly in decisions, workers are represented by a small group of employees who actually participate - quality circles: a work group of 8 to 10 employees and supervisors meet regularly to discuss their quality problems, investigate causes, recommend solutions, and take corrective actions. - employee stock ownership plans (ESOPs): these are company- established benefit plans in which employees acquire stock as part of their benefits. 4. Variable Pay Programs (cfr. Expectancy Theory): Here a portion of an employee’s pay is based on some individual and/or organizational measure of performance. Examples: - Piece-rate pay plans: you are paid a fixed sum for each unit of production completed. - Bonuses: extra payment because of certain achievement. - Profit-sharing plans: compensations based on some established formula designed around a company’s profitability (direct cash outlays or stock options). - gainsharing: an incentive plan in which improvements in group productivity determine the total amount of money that is allocated. 5. Skill Based Pay Plans (cfr. ERG Theory, Reinforcement Theory, Equity These plans set pay levels on the basis of how many skills employees have or how many jobs they can do. For example, if you are a machine operator in a certain company, you earn 14$/hour, but because of the skill based pay plan, you can earn up to a 10 percent premium if you broaden your skills to for example material accounting. Several studies have confirmed that skill based pay generally leads to higher performance and satisfaction. These plans are expanding and already widely used with success. 6. Flexible Benefits (cfr. Expectancy Theory): These allow employees to pick and choose from among a menu of benefit options that exceeds the traditional benefit programs. The options might include hearing, dental and eye coverage; life insurance; extended vacation time; …. This way the different needs of the employees can be met. The major theories and their applications were provided; we want to conclude here with some general guidelines: Recognize Individual Differences Use Goals and Feedback Allow Employees to Participate in Decisions that Affect Them Link Rewards to Performance Check the System for Equity
With Rees (1991, p. 159), we can say that this characteristic is probably the most important of all the characteristics an effective manager needs to possess. Everything a manager does involves communication, his verbal and nonverbal behaviour. Communication between managers and employees is important in the sense that it provides the information necessary to get work done effectively and efficient in organizations. Effective communication is the critical factor that moves a team toward a resolution or consensus (“How to be an effective manager”, 2000, p. 14). Robbins & Coulter provide us with the following communication model (see attachment 1). As we can notice by looking at this model, there are seven factors involved in communication: (1) the communication source, (2) encoding, (3) the message, (4) the channel, (5) decoding, (6) the receiver and (7) feedback. The definition of communication is then “the transfer and understanding of meaning” (Robbins & Coulter, 2002, p. 282). This means that (1) the message has to reach the receiver ( for example a speaker who isn’t heard does not communicate) and (2), more important, the message has also to be understood in the way it was meant by the sender. Interesting to note is that communication can be affected by noise, by which we mean any disturbance that interferes with the transmission, receipt or feedback of a message, for example a phone ringing in the background. Robbins and Coulter (2002, pp. 288-291) distinguish 7 different barriers to effective communication. These are (Robbins & Coulter, 2002, pp. 288-291): 1. Filtering: this is the deliberate manipulation of information to make it appear more favorable to the receiver. For example when a manager tells his boss what his boss wants to hear. 2. Selective perception: when people selectively interpret what they see or hear on the basis of their interests, background, experience and attitudes. For example an employment interviewer who expects a female job applicant to put her family ahead of her career is likely to see that in female applicants, regardless of the fact that it is true or not. 3. Emotions: how a receiver feels when a message is received influences how he or she interprets it. 4. Information overload: when the information we have to work with exceeds our processing capacity. For example tons of e-mails. You are bound to select and this way information gets lost. 5. Defensiveness: when individuals interpret another’s message as threatening, they often respond in ways that hinder effective communication. 6. Language: words mean different things to different people. Age, education and cultural background are three of the more obvious variables that influence the language a person uses and the definitions he or she gives to words. The use of jargon, a specialized terminology or technical language that members of a group use to communicate among themselves, can be a barrier to effective communication. |
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