No matter what kind of managers are in an organization and at what management level, all managers need to have certain management skills. Robert lee L Katz listed three qualities or skills that managers need, and Heinz Weah Ritchie supplemented them. Generally speaking, the qualities or management skills that managers need mainly include:
1, technical skills
Technical skill refers to the understanding and proficiency of a specific activity, especially the skills related to methods, processes, procedures or technologies. Including professional knowledge, analytical ability within the professional scope and the ability to flexibly use the professional tools and skills. Technical skills mainly involve the work of "things" (processes or tangible objects).
2. Personnel skills
Personnel skills refer to the administrative ability that a person can work effectively as a team member, establish cooperative efforts in a team led by managers, that is, cooperative spirit and team spirit, and create a good atmosphere so that employees can freely express their personal views without scruple. Managers' personnel skills refer to the leadership, motivation and communication skills that managers should have to accomplish organizational goals.
3. Ideological skills
Ideological skills include: "the ability to regard the enterprise as a whole, including identifying various interdependent functions in the organization, how the change of one part affects all other parts, and then affects the relationship between individual enterprises and industries, associations and the overall political, social and economic power of the country." That is, the ability to take the overall situation into account, judge important factors and understand the relationship between these factors.
4. Design skills
Design skills refer to the ability to solve problems in various ways that are beneficial to the interests of the organization. Top managers, in particular, should not only find problems, but also have the ability to find a practical solution to a problem like excellent designers. If managers can only see the existence of problems, but only "people who see problems", then managers are unqualified. Managers must also have the ability to find feasible solutions according to the current situation.
The relative importance of these skills to managers at different management levels is different. The importance of technical skills and personnel skills gradually decreases from low to high according to the organizational level of managers, while ideological skills and design skills are the opposite. For grass-roots managers, having technical skills is the most important, and having personnel skills is also very helpful in frequent communication with subordinates. When the manager's organizational level in the organization develops from the grassroots to the middle and high level, with the decrease of the number and frequency of his direct contact with subordinates, the importance of personnel skills gradually decreases. In other words, for middle managers, the requirements for technical skills have dropped, while the requirements for ideological skills have risen, and personnel skills are still very important. But for top managers, ideological skills and design skills are particularly important, while the requirements for technical skills and personnel skills are relatively low. Of course, the relationship between management skills and organizational level is not absolute, and some factors such as the size of the organization will also have a certain impact on it.
Second, what is a manager?
Managers are the main body of the management behavior process, and managers are generally composed of people or groups with corresponding rights and responsibilities, certain management ability and engaged in realistic management activities. Managers and their management skills play a decisive role in organizational management activities. Managers achieve the goal of organizing activities by coordinating and supervising the work of others.
Third, classification
1, front-line management personnel
Front-line managers mainly manage hired workers who participate in the production of products and provide services. Often called a supervisor.
2. Middle manager
Middle managers manage the work of front-line managers, usually including regional managers, project managers and planning managers.
3. Senior manager
The top management in the organizational structure is the senior manager, who has the responsibility to make the external organizational decisions of the organizer, make plans and accomplish the goals that are beneficial to the organization. Usually called: executive vice president, president, general manager, business president, etc.
Fourth, the role of managers.
1. Managers are people with positions and corresponding powers.
The authority of the manager is the qualification of the manager to engage in management activities. The higher the position of manager, the greater the power. Organizations or groups must give managers certain powers. If a manager is in a certain position, but does not have the corresponding authority, then the manager cannot manage. Weber believes that managers have three kinds of power: traditional power: traditional practice or hereditary, such as emperor hereditary system; Extraordinary power: it comes from worshipping and following others, is emotional and irrational, and is not based on rules and regulations but on prestige established in the past; Statutory power: Statutory power refers to the power stipulated by law, which is possessed through legal procedures, such as directly electing the president.
But in fact, in management activities, managers only have legal power, so it is difficult to do a good job in management. Managers should pay attention to "personal influence" in their work and become managers with certain authority. The so-called "authority" refers to the prestige and prestige of managers in the organization, which is a non-mandatory "influence". The authority is illegal and cannot authorize others. Although authority has a certain relationship with the position, it mainly depends on the personal quality, thought, knowledge, ability and level of the manager; It depends on the ideological and emotional communication with the employees of the organization; Depends on mutual understanding, trust and support. Once this "influence" is formed, all kinds of talents and employees will be attracted by managers and accept their guidance and command wholeheartedly, thus generating great material strength.
2. The manager is a person with certain responsibilities.
The manager of any organization or group has a certain position, and should use and exercise the corresponding power and bear certain responsibilities at the same time. Power and responsibility are a contradictory unity, and some power is always associated with some responsibility. When the organization endows managers with certain positions and positions, thus forming certain powers, correspondingly, managers also assume the responsibility for the organization. In the managers at all levels of an organization, responsibilities and powers must be symmetrical and clear. Without responsibility, power will inevitably lead to the improper use of power by managers, while without power, responsibility will be vague and difficult to bear. People with power but no responsibility or responsibility but no power can hardly play their due role in their work and become real managers.
Responsibility is the basic requirement for managers. After being empowered, managers should bear corresponding responsibilities for the fate of the organization or group and corresponding obligations to the members of the organization or group. Power and responsibility should rise and fall simultaneously. The greater the power, the heavier the responsibility. Comparatively speaking, responsibility is more essential than power, power is only a means to fulfill responsibility, and responsibility is the real symbol of managers. If a manager only has authority and no corresponding responsibility, then the manager can't manage well. Managers are different because they are responsible. If managers fail to fulfill their responsibilities, it means dereliction of duty and abandonment of management.
3. The main theories of western management scholars about the role of managers.
Peter drucker, a famous American management scientist, put forward the concept of "manager's role" in 1955. Drucker believes that management is an invisible force, which is embodied in managers at all levels. Therefore, the roles or responsibilities of managers are generally divided into three categories:
1) Manage the survival and development of an enterprise. To this end, managers must do: first, determine what the organization does? What should the goal be? How to take active measures to achieve the goal? The second is to seek the maximization of organizational interests; The third is "serving the society" and "creating customers".
2) Executive Manager. In the upper, middle and lower levels of an organization, everyone is a manager and everyone is a managed person, so managers must do the following: first, ensure that the ideas, wishes and efforts of subordinates can move towards the same goal; The second is to cultivate the spirit of collective cooperation; The third is to train subordinates; The fourth is to establish and improve the organizational structure.
3) Manage workers and work. Managers must realize two assumptions: first, the nature of work is changing rapidly, manual labor and mental labor coexist, and the proportion of mental labor will become larger and larger; Second, regarding people, we should correctly understand the importance of "individual differences, complete people, actions for a reason, and human dignity" in dealing with the relationship between people at all levels.
A widely cited study by henry mintzberg holds that managers play ten roles, which can be further divided into three categories: interpersonal role, information role and decision-making role.
1) interpersonal roles
Interpersonal roles are directly generated from the formal power base of managers, who play interpersonal roles in dealing with the relationships with organizational members and other stakeholders. Interpersonal roles include representative roles, leadership roles and liaison roles.
(1) representative role. As the leaders of the unit, managers must perform some ceremonial duties. For example, managers sometimes appear at community gatherings, participate in social activities, or entertain important customers. In doing so, managers play a representative role.
② Leadership. Because managers are responsible for the success or failure of their units, managers must play a leading role in the working group. For this role, managers and employees work together to ensure the realization of organizational goals through the efforts of employees.
③ The role of the contact person. Managers play the role of liaison when cooperating with individuals and working groups within the organization, or when establishing good relations with external stakeholders. Managers must have a keen insight into important organizational issues so that they can establish relationships and networks inside and outside the organization.
2) Information role
In the information role, the manager is responsible for ensuring that the people he works with have enough information to complete the work smoothly. Determined by the nature of management responsibilities, managers are not only the information transmission center of their units, but also the information transmission channels of other working groups in the organization. People in the whole organization rely on the management structure and managers to obtain or transmit the necessary information in order to complete the work. The information roles that managers must play include three roles: supervisor, disseminator and spokesman.
④ The role of the supervisor. Managers continue to pay attention to the changes in the internal and external environment of the organization in order to obtain useful information for the organization. Managers collect information by contacting subordinates and obtain information provided by the other party from personal networks. Based on this information, managers can identify the potential opportunities and threats of the organization.
⑤ The role of the communicator. Managers, as information directors, distribute a large amount of information they have obtained.
⑥ The role of the spokesman. Managers must pass information to individuals outside the unit or organization.
3) Decision-making role
In the decision-making role, managers process information and draw conclusions. If information is not used for organizational decision-making, it will lose its due value. Decision-making roles include entrepreneurs, interference opponents, resource allocators and negotiators.
⑦ Entrepreneur role. Managers pay close attention to the changes in the internal and external environment of the organization and the development of the situation in order to find opportunities and invest in the found opportunities to take advantage of them.
(8) Intervention coping role. It means that managers must be good at dealing with conflicts or solving problems, such as calming customers' anger, negotiating with uncooperative suppliers, or mediating disputes between employees.
Pet-name ruby resource allocator role. The manager decides which projects the organization's resources are used for.
Play the role of a negotiator. Managers spend a lot of time in negotiation, and the negotiating objects of managers include employees, suppliers, customers and other working groups.
The relationship between the manager and the managed
The management of people is to deal with the relationship between leaders and subordinates, managers and the managed, and the relationship between people is the content of the system, so the management of people depends on the system. The content of management system is very extensive, including analysis system, prediction system, planning system, decision-making system, control system, organization system, leadership system, coordination system, evaluation system, incentive and restraint system and so on. , but there are two key aspects, one is the evaluation system, and the other is the incentive system (also called the incentive and restraint system). Other systems themselves must embody the contents of the incentive and restraint system. Evaluation is the basis of motivation. Without evaluation, motivation has no basis, no goal and no effect, so management is scientific. In the station, whether it is the manager or the managed, in the supervision work, everyone is the manager.