The 3 Basic Functions of a Manager

All managers perform certain basic functions- planning, organizing, and controlling. Managers implement their decisions in these areas through the business employees. This means that communicating and motivating people are especially important management skills.

All managers, whether of the individual or team variety, perform the functions of planning, organizing and controlling. They plan when they set goals and determine how to reach them. They organize when they decide who will do what and how they will do it. They control when they set standards and evaluate performance.

All three of these management functions involve making decisions. Some decisions will be fairly simple or routine. Other decisions will be difficult and complicated.

1. Planning. It is the first step in the management process. It involves deciding what will be done and how it will be accomplished. Good management planning at any level is realistic, comprehensive, and flexible. It includes plans for the short- and long-range uses of people, technology, and material resources.

To be an effective management tool, a management plan should be reduced to written form. When writing their plans, managers or management teams should not try to anticipate every possibility. An overly and detailed document offers too many opportunities for misinterpretation.

Once the written plan is complete, let’s say the title of your plan for your folder printing business is to make unique folders and that your target customers are those large corporations, your plan should be distributed to and discussed with everyone who needs to know it especially the team that will do the folder printing. The managers should keep their management plans flexible so they can be easily revised in response to comment or change. They should also review and revise their plans often.

2. Organizing. It is a coordinated effort to reach a company’s planning goals. It involves assigning responsibility, establishing working relationship, staffing, and directing the work of employees. Assigning responsibility and establishing working relationships are functions usually carried out by top and middle management, even in horizontal companies. Staffing which includes selecting and training new employees, is often shared by middle management and supervisors. Supervisors usually direct employees’ work.

The organizing function in the largest companies is complex. There may be hundreds of middle level managers, thousands of supervisors, and tens of thousands of employees. Since the work is divided among so many people, middle managers and supervisors in traditional companies are usually given a relatively narrow range of responsibilities.

3. Controlling. It is the process of comparing what you planned with the actual performance. It involves three basic activities- setting standards, evaluating performance according to those standards, and solving any problems revealed by the evaluation.

Before setting standards, many companies compose a mission statement. The mission statement concludes with its people-oriented goals: “We will be helpful, courteous, and professional to each other and the public. We will strive to have a completely satisfied customer at the end of each transaction.”

Once a company has a goal of this sort, it will adopt standards that are consistent with them. Once standards have been established, managers can the use them to evaluate both company and individual performance. When performance does not meet established standards, managers must identify and solve the problem. For example, employees may not be performing up to standard. Why? There may be problems in conveying what they need to perform well. The defect rate in the company products may be up sharply. Why? Equipment may be malfunctioning. Solutions in these cases might involve additional training for the employees and adjustment or replacement of the equipment.

These are the things that managers should do to motivate employees to go one step further and beyond what is asked of them, which in turn will benefit not only the business but the employees as well.