Principles of Management: Introduction to Management 1

0:00 hi I'm Thomas and welcome to the course principles of management this is our first lecture introduction to management let's begin with the question why are managers important managers play several important roles one they identify critical issues or problems and responses or create solutions to those problems second managers create and coordinate systems to get things done an organization has goals in order to achieve those goals there needs to be a system there needs to be a strategy a stepbystep process to achieve the goal and it's the manager's responsibility to create and coordinate those systems the

0:49 relationship that a manager has with his or her employees will drive loyalty to an organization employees are neutral at the beginning when they join an organization their primary goal is usually receiving their salary the better the manager is that engaging the employee and supporting that employee the more that employee will show loyalty to the organization and finally managers affect financial performance the good manager will achieve Good Financial results or support the organization in achieving Good Financial results and ineffective manager will have a negative effect on financial

1:36 performance who are managers and where do they work managers are people who coordinate and oversee the work of other people there isn't just one manager at a company there are levels or layers of management line managers are working at the lowest level of management working directly with employees and sometimes even doing the same tasks as the employees they're managing middle managers at the middle level of an organization are responsible for managing the line managers and at the senior management level or the top management level the senior level of the organization oversees the overall activities and strategies of an

2:22 organization so what is an organization an organization has a particular purpose has a particular goal in addition an organization consists of people an organization isn't just a machine or a computer or an idea there are actual people carrying out tasks and working towards the goals of an organization and they do that in a particular structure an organization is structured in a particular way to be able to achieve the goals of the organization next let's look at the functions of managers managers have four functions planning organizing leading and controlling planning relates

3:08 to the goals and the strategies of an organization organizing is deciding what are the correct activities how will we perform those activities and who are the particular people that will do those activities in the organization leading is the idea of working with people towards the particular goals of the organization work isn't just an activity work is going towards something it's working in the direction of something and that is that something is the organization goals and finally managers control that means that they monitor they watch the activity of the organization they

3:54 evaluate to decide are we working towards our goals and they correct when they see things aren't happening as they should they make changes and adjustments and note that all four of these functions lead to the ultimate goal of achieving the organization's purpose next let's look at the roles of managers three categories of roles are interpersonal informational and decisional at the interpersonal role a manager is a figure head which means someone that is looked at as the representative of an idea or an organization and leader someone who's leading the organization in a particular direction towards a particular

4:41 goal managers are informational they collect information and share that information with the other managers and employees in the organization and finally managers are decisional they play four roles at the decisional level they're entrepreneurs they're coming up with new creative ideas they are problem solvers when there are problems they come up with solutions they are resource allocators which means they decide the best use of the employees and the resources of the organization in working towards goals and finally they are negotiators sometimes they're negotiating directly with other employees sometimes they're helping with negotiations between one

5:28 employee and another and at other times are involved in negotiations between the organization and other entities the skills required of managers fall into the categories of technical human and conceptual technical skills are job specific those are the skills that you need to be able to perform a job effectively and those are typically the focus of line managers again line managers are the lowest level of management working directly with employees doing the day-to-day tasks of an organization next at the human skill level this is the ability to work well with other people and middle managers focus on the human

6:16 skills and finally the conceptual skills of managers are a highlevel skill set this is understanding complex situations understanding abstract ideas understanding how to deal with the big challenges and the big goals of a company and conceptual skills are most closely tied to the role of senior or top level managers in managing it's important to understand the difference between efficiency and Effectiveness efficiency is getting things done with the least cost possible here we describe efficiency as maximum output from minimum inputs and effect is achieving goals successfully these

7:03 two often conflict we can be effective but not efficient we might achieve a goal at a very high cost that would be effective but not efficient we might be efficient we might be very good at managing our costs and using our resources efficiently but in the end we might not be effective we might not end up achieving the organizational goals so it's important to develop a balance between efficiency and Effectiveness this concludes part one of introduction to management and we will continue with the video for part two