The evolution of management thought

 

Management thought has evolved in bits and pieces over the years. Although the practice of management dates back to the earliest recorded history, the systematic study of management is largely a product of the twentieth century. An information explosion in management theory has created a management theory jungle. Five conventional approaches to management are: (1) the universal process approach, (2) the operational approach, (3) the behavioral approach, (4) the systems approach, and (5) the contingency approach. A modern  unconventional approach centers on Peters� and Waterman's attributes of corporate excellence.

Henri Fayol's universal process approach assumes that all organizations, regardless of purpose or size, require the same management process. Furthermore, it assumes that this rational process can be reduced to separate functions and principles of management. The universal process approach, the oldest of the various approaches, is still popular today.

Dedicated to promoting production efficiency and reducing waste, the operational approach has evolved from scientific management to opeations management. Frederick W. Taylor, the father of scientific manage�ment, and his followers revolutionized industrial management through the use of standardization, time and motion study, selection and training, and pay incentives. Largely a product of the post-World War II era, operations management has broadened the scientific pursuit of efficiency to include all productive organizations. Operations management specialists often rely on sophisticated models and quantitative techniques.

Management has turned to the human factor in the human relations movement and organizational behavior. Emerging from such factors as unionization, the Hawthorne studies, and the philosophy of industrial humanism, the human relations movement began as a concerted effort to make employees' needs a high management priority. Today, organizational behavior tries to identify the multiple determinants of job performance.

Advocates of the systems approach recommend that modern organiza�tion, he viewed as open systems. Open systems depend on the outside environment for survival, whereas closed systems do not. General systems theory, an interdisciplinary field based on the assumption that everything is systematically related, has identified a hierarchy of systems and has differentiated closed and open system.

The contingency approach is an effort to determine through research which managerial practices and techniques are appropriate in specific situations. It is characterized by an open-system perspective, a practical research orientation, and a multivariate approach to research.