Artefacts

What does it mean to be an effective Manager? 

Being a financial management enthuast, I have utilized every chance that has come my way to attend a seminar, workshop or even a presentation that is focusing on financial management. Management itself is very complex and that is the reason every person has opinion about what is good management and what is bad management. In future, I would like to become the best financial manager ever because I have the passion and zeal that will propel me to achieve my target. That dream is motivated by my desire to operate an organization efficiently so as to maximize the stakeholder’s wealth and also enhance corporate governance which seems to have fallen out of favor with many financial managers (Erkens, et al.2012, p.402). To be effective manager, I have to learn how to address certain factors which cannot be avoided and which at the same time can help me develop my career and achieve my dream. This is a reflective report is written to address how one can become an effective manager.

Artefacts refer to observations that are made after carrying out research. The observations help us to understand is not clearly understood and also increase our knowledge (Curkovic, et al.2000, p.889). To fully understand how one can become effective manager, I had to select three artefacts which will help me understand what management is, how context of managers’ work has changed and key functions that managers need to address in order to be effective.

Organizing is a management function which is responsible for organizing human resources, physical resources and financial resources. It is measured qualitatively. These resources enable the organization to have the capacity to execute the operations of the organizations and achieve the goals of the organization (Meyer, et al.2013, p.502). In many presentations and workshops, I have attended, team work has been advocated as being a very important component of organization. No one can dispute the claims as unity is strength and helps in breaking down complex tasks into simple tasks that can be easily executed. Teamwork has many advantages which can help managers address many challenges and also help in understanding what management is because different people have different views concerning management.

In the presentation about team work, I learnt that composition of the team is very important. The team should be comprised of people with the same goals and objectives so that they can be motivated as achievements of the team are also achievements of the team members (Acosta, et al.2012, p.13). With the changing nature of managers’ work, team work also helps the management to come up with ideas that will be used in addressing challenges such how to improve the competitive advantage, pricing decisions, dividends decisions and even investment decisions.

Organizing Function

The presentation could not end without someone voicing out the disadvantages of the team which if not well addressed can lead to the organization not achieving its goals and objectives. It is extremely hard to find a group of employees with similar goals which the manager can group them together to perform a certain task. In most cases, the group members have different goals or each team member is following his own goal (Agrawal, 2012, p.390). This will lead to failure of the organization and manager will be considered as a failure in the organization. As a future manager, I will be required to come up with a criteria of forming teams so that my organization can be effective.

This refers with organizations’ staff having different capabilities, skills, goals and ambitions. Organizations need work force diversity so as to accomplish different functions in the organization as similar work force cannot be effective (Cohen, et al.2011, p.95). This artefact has hardened the managers’ context of work because managing different people becomes very difficult. The manager’s work becomes very difficult when it comes to motivating the employees in the organization (Okoro, and Washington, 2012, p.57). The manager has to make sure that the employees needs have been satisfied. The needs include social, security needs, growth and self-actualization according to many theorists who decided to venture in motivation of employees. Poor motivation will lead to poor performance of the organization. Motivation is not only tied to monitory value but also in other intangible aspects which are very important to employees. According to the many articles I have read about employee motivation, poor motivation will lead to increased employee turnover and this will increase the hiring costs of the firms. Such aspects make the managers work very difficult. 

Delegation of duties in an organization with work force diversity is a night mare to the manager (Olsen, and Martins, 2012, p.1174). The manager cannot perform all the tasks and this means he will delegate the work to the subordinates. In the process, the work can be delegated a person who does not have the skills and abilities to perform well (Seiler, et al.2012, p.67). This will lead to poor performance in the organization. As a future manager, I will be required to spend more time understanding my employees so that I can motivate them well. This will also force me to be cautious when delegating duties and this implies that I will have a lot work at my disposal. Such work can divert my attention from more important aspects of the organization.

Workforce Diversity

Refers to the ability to understand the emotions of one’s self and those of others and know how to manage them well (Cavazotte, et al.2012, p.451). It has five components which when used well can lead to high performance in the organization. The components are self-awareness, self-regulation, motivation, social skills and empathy. The manager should not allow emotional feelings cloud the judgment when making critical decisions. Managers with perfect score is over 160 while average score is between 90-100. Managers need to have empathy when performing directing functions so as not to hurt the feelings of the employees (Brunetto, et al.2012, p.432). The manager should first enquire why the employee is underperforming before making decisions that can lead to poor performance of the employee.

Emotional intelligence also gives managers self-awareness and self-regulation when making decisions. Such components help managers when planning and setting targets so as to avoid setting unachievable targets due to influence of ego and desire to show other people that you are the king. As a future manager, EI will help me to be able to have empathy on my employees when they are going through difficult times and they need motivation (Farh, et al.2012, p.890). This will help me to become the best financial manager as my employees are well motivated. Since there is still room to improve my EI from average, to perfect score, I will do my best to improve the score so that I can improve my self-awareness and self-regulation. This will help to trim my ego to the right measure so that I don’t end up setting unachievable targets.

Management is a broad aspect which cannot be understood by just reading few books and shallow research. Through secondary research, I have learnt that organizing is part of management. Managers context of work continue becoming more complex because of much information and diverse work force in organizations. Motivation as a function of management should be well addressed if the goals of the organization are to be achieved.

Conclusions

From the findings above, it is impossible to talk about organizing without mention the word management. Organizing is a component of management which without it, management is incomplete. Organizing is concerned with assembling the production resources so that operations of the firm can start or continue. In the assembling process, manager is required to assemble teams that will perform different tasks in the organization. Although the teams have disadvantages if not well assembled I still will use them when I become a manager because they have more benefits such as more ideas which can lead to innovation and also breaking down complex tasks into simple tasks.

Emotional Intelligence

From the report above, managers’ work is evolving each and every day and becoming more complex because of work force diversity. Managing people in the organization becomes very difficult and this can lead to poor performance in the organization. With diverse work force, managers should be very cautious when delegating duties so as not allocate duties to inefficient staff who will not perform the tasks well as expected. Work force diversity is very important as this is the only reason organizations are able to perform different tasks efficiently. In this case, I can conclude that work force diversity is inevitable in many organizations. As future manager, more time should be spend understanding employees so as to motivate them well and lead to job satisfaction and high performance.

Emotional intelligence is the component that separates humanity from animosity. Managers should employ high degree of emotional intelligence so as to motivate the employees well. The employees feel appreciated and cared for and this will improve the productivity of the employees. In order to be effective, managers have to demonstrate a high level of self-awareness and self-regulation so that they can lead by example. This will help the managers not to make decisions that are clouded by personal emotions and we all know that such a move is suicidal to the business development. Empathy and social skills should be used regularly so as to create relationships and bonds between the managers and the employees. In my view, managers that interact often with their employees have performed better that their counterparts who have no social skills to interact with their employees. From the reflection above, it is now clear that managers’ context of work keep on evolving and motivation function should be well addressed by all managers 

References

Acosta, H., Salanova, M. and Llorens, S., 2012. How organizational practices predict team work engagement: the role of organizational trust. Ciencia & Trabajo, 14(1), pp.7-15.

Agrawal, V., 2012. Managing the diversified team: challenges and strategies for improving performance. Team Performance Management: An International Journal, 18(7/8), pp.384-400.

Brunetto, Y., Teo, S.T., Shacklock, K. and Farr?Wharton, R., 2012. Emotional intelligence, job satisfaction, well?being and engagement: explaining organisational commitment and turnover intentions in policing. Human Resource Management Journal, 22(4), pp.428-441.

Cavazotte, F., Moreno, V. and Hickmann, M., 2012. Effects of leader intelligence, personality and emotional intelligence on transformational leadership and managerial performance. The Leadership Quarterly, 23(3), pp.443-455.

Cohen, J.J., Gabriel, B.A. and Terrell, C., 2011. The case for diversity in the health care workforce. Health affairs, 21(5), pp.90-102.

Curkovic, S., Vickery, S. and Dröge, C., 2000. Quality?related action programs: Their impact on quality performance and firm performance. Decision Sciences, 31(4), pp.885-902.

Erkens, D.H., Hung, M. and Matos, P., 2012. Corporate governance in the 2007–2008 financial crisis: Evidence from financial institutions worldwide. Journal of corporate finance, 18(2), pp.389-411.

Farh, C.I., Seo, M.G. and Tesluk, P.E., 2012. Emotional intelligence, teamwork effectiveness, and job performance: The moderating role of job context. Journal of Applied Psychology, 97(4), p.890.

Meyer, R.E., Höllerer, M.A., Jancsary, D. and Van Leeuwen, T., 2013. The visual dimension in organizing, organization, and organization research: Core ideas, current developments, and promising avenues. Academy of Management Annals, 7(1), pp.489-555.

Okoro, E.A. and Washington, M.C., 2012. Workforce diversity and organizational communication: Analysis of human capital performance and productivity. Journal of Diversity Management (Online), 7(1), p.57.

Olsen, J.E. and Martins, L.L., 2012. Understanding organizational diversity management programs: A theoretical framework and directions for future research. Journal of Organizational behavior, 33(8), pp.1168-1187.

Seiler, S., Lent, B., Pinkowska, M. and Pinazza, M., 2012. An integrated model of factors influencing project managers’ motivation—Findings from a Swiss Survey. International Journal of Project Management, 30(1), pp.60-72.