MBA Ist Semester Management Concepts And Applications Short Questions Answers Notes Study Material Solved case studies for practise 3 mock papers for self-assessment
Section B
Short Answer Questions
MBA Ist Semester Management Concepts And Applications Short Questions Answers Notes .page.1
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Q.1. Explain the contribution of F.W. Taylor in the development of scientific management.
Ans. Taylor and Scientific Management: Frederick Winslow Taylor (1856-1915) Popularly known as F.W. Taylor is considered to be the father of scientific management. He was a great scholar of United States of America. He was the First person in the field of management who originated the concept of scientific management. He started his career as an apprentice in a small factory that was making machinery in Philadelphia in 1875 when he was only 19 Years of age. After a period of 3 Years, he was appointed as a worker in ‘Mid value steelworkers’ again only after a period of 2 years, he was promoted to the post of the gang boss. He was promoted to the responsible post of Chief Engineer only after another period of 4 years when he was 28 years of age. During this period, he got a degree of Master of Engineering by joining evening classes. In 1898, he resigned this company and joined ‘Bethlehem Steel Company. He continued his job up to 1901 in this company. Thereafter he resigned this job and passed the rest part of his life in developing the techniques and concept of management. While working in mid value Steel Workers, he realised that the workers were not making the best use of their abilities and capacities. He also realised that the reason for this under utilisation of capacity was the use of trial and error approach by the management. FW. Taylor also felt that there was a lack of efficient work standards, absence of division of responsibility, lack of incentive to workers, unscientific selection and placement of workers. Above problems encouraged EW. Taylor and he decided to improve the practices of management through his practical experience. He conducted a series of experiments for his purpose. He developed the techniques of systematic speed, scientific selection and training of workers, etc. Later on, he converted his concept and techniques into a philosophy which is known as scientific management. Throughout his career, he made all efforts to eliminate the wastages. He felt that the main cause of inefficiency was lack of scientific approach to the managerial problems and lack of proper planning of the method and techniques of production.
Q.2. What is Fayol’s administrative management? Explain.
Ans. Fayol’s Administrative Management: The name of Henri Fayol is specifically notable in the development of management science. He was contemporary of FW. Taylor. He was born in 1841 in France. Henri Fayol completed his education of mine engineering at the age of 19 years and started his career as an engineer in Commentary Four Chambault of France in 1860 and he passed the rest of his life in this institute. After the period of 6 years, he was promoted to the post of manager of coal mines. He served this institute on this post for about 20 years. Then he was promoted to the post of general manager and he served on this post for about 30 years and contributed much in the development and all-around the growth of this institute. He retired in 1918 and he became director of this company till his death in 1925.
Henri Fayol is known as the father of the principle of management. His contribution to the science of management is worth appreciating. The words of Mrityunjay Banerjee may be remembered in this regard. He said unlike E.W. Taylor, Henri Fayol worked from the top of the industrial hierarchy to downwards and tried to give scientific shape to the experiences he gained in the highest control of large scale undertaking. Henri Fayol was of the opinion that management is a different function and separate skill. He introduced many concepts and principles for universal application. He published a book in 1916 in French. This book contains all the principles of general and industrial management and deals with the administrative philosophy of Henri Fayol. The contribution of Henri Fayol can be described as under:
1. Writing Work: Henri Fayol published a book in 1916 based on his experiences. The book General and Industrial Administration was published in French language. English edition of this book was published for the first time in 1929. In this, he has made an attempt to describe the principle of management and to present his ideas in a systematic manner.
2. Division of Industrial Activities: Henri Fayol has divided the activities of an industrial undertaking into the following six groups:
(a) Managerial Activities: It includes planning, organisation, coordination, direction and control, etc.
(b) Accounting Activities: It includes the valuation of stock, the preparation of final accounts, preparation of cost accounts and the collection of data on various other aspects of the business affairs. It also includes the analysis and interpretation of these accounts and information.
(c) Security Activities: It includes all activities relating to the safety and security of goods and properties.
(d) Financial Activities: It includes all the activities relating to the acquisition of capital and its optimum use.
(e) Commercial Activities: It includes all the activities relating to purchase, sale and exchange
(f) Technical Activities: It includes all activities relating to the process of production enterprise.
0.3. What is the bureaucracy? Explain.
Ans. Bureaucracy: Given by Max Weber, a sociologist in the early 1900’s, Weber presented what he thought was an ideal organisation structure that he called a bureaucracy. Weber specified several characteristics of his ideal organisation structure. The four major ones are as follows:
1. Hierarchical Position: In an organisation, there are positions arranged in the hierarchy. Each lower office is under the control and supervision of the higher one.
2. Impersonal Relationships: It was Weber’s belief that an ideal official should be dominated by a spirit of a formalistic impersonal relationship without hatred or passion and hence should be without affection and enthusiasm. He felt that in order for bureaucrats to make completely rational decisions, they must avoid immaterial attachment to subordinates, clients and customers.
3. Specialisation and Division of Labour: Weber’s bureaucracy contained a specified sphere of competence. This involves:
(a) A sphere of obligations to perform functions which have been marked off as a part of the systematic division of labour.
(b) That the necessary means of compulsion are clearly defined and their use is subject to definite conditions.
(c) The provision of the incumbency is with the necessary authority. It implies that Weber recognised the importance of having the authority to carry out assigned duties.
4. A System of Abstract Rules: According to Weber, a rational approach of organisation requires a set of formal rules to ensure uniformity and coordination of efforts. A well-understood system of regulations also provides continuity and stability. Rules persist whereas personal may frequently change.
Q.4. What is the contribution of human relations approach to management? Discuss its criticisms also.
Ans. Contribution of Human Relations Approach: The proponents of human approach emphasised the following contributions of the Hawthorne experiments:
1. The organisation is a social system that is imposed of many interacting parts. The workers follow social norms determined by their co-workers, which define the proper amount of work,
rather than try to achieve the targets, management thinks which they can achieve.
2. The social environment of the job affects the workers and is also affected by them.
3. Along with formal organisation, the informal organisation also exists and both affect each other.
4. At the workplace, workers act as members of the group rather than an individual. The group plays an important role in determining the attitudes and performance of individual workers. A worker who resists changing of his attitude as an individual often changes it, if the group of which he is a member changes its behaviour.
5. Informal leadership emerges along which leadership and the formal leader helps workers to function as a social group, rendering the formal leader ineffective, unless he conforms to the norms of the group of which he is supposed to be the incharge.
6. Both way communication is necessary because it carries information downwards for proper functioning of organisation and transmits upward the feelings of the employees.
7. Man’s approach is not always rational as he may behave irrationally as far as rewards from the
job are concerned.
8. Money is only one of the motivator of human behaviour and not the sole motivator.
9. There may be conflicts between organisation and individual goals and for the smooth function of the management, organisation’s integration of these goals is necessary.
Criticisms of Human Relations Approach: The human relations approach has been criticised on the following grounds:
1. Invalid Assumptions: Some assumptions of the approach are unrealistic, for instance the assumption that there is a solution of every problem, which satisfies every one in the organisation, is not true. There are many conflicts of interests among various groups.
2. Lack of Scientific Validity: Hawthorne studies were based on clinical insight rather than scientific evidence groups. Chosen were not representative in character and experiments are focused on operative employees only. 3. Limited Focus on Workers: Human relations approach puts all the emphasis on interpersonal relations and lacks adequate focus on work.
4. Over-emphasis on Happiness: This approach over-emphasises the happiness of employees and assumes that happy employees will be productive employees. There is no consistency between happiness and productivity and even happy employees are often unproductive.
Q.5. What is contingency approach? Explain its features.
Ans. Contingency Approach: It is a situational approach whose basic idea is that there can’t be a particular management action which will be suitable for all the situations. It tries to fill the relationship gap between an organisation and its environment by suggesting what
leage Bo should be done in response to an event in the environment.
It is also known as the situational theory which considers that
approach is an important there is no prescribed managerial action or organisational design
addition to the paradigm that is suitable for all organisations. Contingency theory is based on
of modern theory of the systems view of the organisation.
Features of Contingency Approach: The features of this approach are as follows:
- It is situation specific, i.e: the overall approach is contingent upon its own situation. 2
2. It is action-oriented and directed towards suggesting organisational design.
3. It is comprehensive because it takes account of a wide range of variables.
4. It is flexible and not an ad-hoc device but a long-range strategy.
5. It is more pro-active than reactive and doesn’t merely emphasise changes in organizational structure and process.
0.6. What is the social system approach? Explain its features.
Ans. Social System Approach: Social system approach of management was introduced by Vilfredo Pareto, later on, developed by Chester Barnard who synthesised this concept. According to this approach, an organisation is essentially a cultural system which is composed of people who work in cooperation. Hence, in order to achieve organisational goals, the management should develop a cooperative system by understanding the behaviour of the people in groups. Thus, this approach is based on the theory of cooperation which implies that an individual tries to satisfy his needs through cooperation with others. The people in the formal organisation must work in coordination in order to achieve common goals. Under this system, the people act and react together, work together and share the rewards together.
This approach is formal in nature which criticises the concept of economic man, it considers an organisation as a social organism. Subject to all the pressures and conflicts of the cultural environment it studies and analyses the individual social behaviour as well as group behaviour as it affects the field of management
Features of Social System Approach: The major features of this approach are as follows:
1. The organisation is a social system.
2. It is a system of cultural relations.
0.9. Discuss the scope of management,
Ans, the scope of Management: Management is a process of planning, organising, motivating, coordinating and controlling the activities of a business enterprise for the attainment of pre-determined goals. It is a very long process which starts with the establishment of business and so continues until the predetermined goals are attained. Therefore, it is very difficult to define the scope of the management process. However, a committee of the education of England had defined nine areas of the scope of management. These areas are as under:
1. Development Management: It attempts for the development of business activities through adopting scientific investigation and research,
2. Personnel Management: It provides the appointment, training, promotion, transfer of suitable personnel for the business enterprise, It also attempts in offering an incentive wage system for them. It is also related to providing best facilities to the workers.
3. Financial Management: It becomes an important function of the management to arrange adequate finance for the running of a business,
4. Production Management: It includes the planning, organising and coordinating the production activity, It also includes the analysis and quality control of the product.