EVOLUTION OF MANAGEMENT THEORY

1.0 INTRODUCTION

Management is as old as man. There are several theories and principles under which the discipline operates. The principles guiding operations of managers have evolved over time. The evolutionary or development of management is spread over several periods. Therefore in this unit, we shall be studying the evolutionary process of management as a discipline.

table of content A

1. personal selling and sales promotion 
2. branding 
3. evolution of management theory
4. organising 
5. planning
6. recruitment and selection
7. advertising and publicity
8. channels of distribution
9. communication
10. control
11. decision-making in business
12. delegation and decentralisation of authority
13. employee training and development
14. introduction to marketing

2.0 OBJECTIVES

At the end of this unit, you should be able to:

1. discuss the evolutionary process of management as a discipline from the pre-industrial period to the modern-day 
2. illustrate the contributions of the various management scholars  explain modern approaches to management 
3.  describe management process as propounded by various schools. 

3.0 MAIN CONTENT

3.1 Pre-Industrial Period

In the pre-industrial period, management was practiced by various parts of the world including Africa. The well-known kingdom of Ghana, Mali and Songhai are known to have had a wonderful administrative system. Ghana’s judicial system, for example, was well organised and managed and had both a lower court and a court of appeal. The army was very efficient and well disciplined that the King of Ghana can put up 200,000 warriors in the field within a short notice.

The importance attached to commerce and craftsmanship was evidenced by the lucrative trade between Ghana and other countries such as Spain, Morocco, and all North African countries. The shops of the local craftsmen dotted the market places. Cloth weavers, potters and shoemakers were abundant, and some employed more than two scores of men and apprentices. What is said of Ghana can be said of Mali. Taxes were very efficiently collected from businessmen and craftsmen, wood carvers, silversmiths, goldsmiths, copper smiths, weavers, tanners and dyers. The king’s affairs were so well organised and so efficiently and effectively run that it was devoid of bureaucracy. The kings planned, organised, and coordinated the international trade that existed between their kingdoms/countries and foreign countries.

Another well documented, properly organised management system was that of the Egyptians who carried out organised activities such as the construction of pyramids, irrigation projects and the building of canals. The Pharaohs and their viziers were the managers who planned, organised and directed and controlled the work of the subordinates. Management of enterprises was also practiced by the Babylonians, the Romans and the Greeks who were engaged in commerce.

3.2 Industrial Revolution

This was the period of intellectual awakening when the scientific and technological discoveries of Galileo, Watt, Gilbert and Harvey, and other prominent geniuses gave rise to the industrial revolution. One of the major advantages of the industrial revolution is that it gave birth to accelerated rate of resources accumulation and the growth of large scale enterprises. It brought under one roof - hundreds of employees working together.

This created its own management problems for the entrepreneurs. It made the division of labour, specialisation and delegation of responsibilities necessary as the owner-manager could no longer supervise all his operations alone. The entrepreneur was forced by competition to engage in crude performance of managerial functions. He still regarded his employees as part of his “tools”. Employees resented the factory conditions and the meager wages while employers fought back with “blacklist”, dismissal and threats. There were series of pools, mergers and trusts as a way of adapting to the environment.

With this, emerged different concepts and principles on how to manage a business effectively. These are conveniently divided here into four groups as listed below.

1.  The scientific management movement 
2. The human relations school 
3.  The administrative school, and 
4.  The modern approaches to management. 

3.2.1 The Scientific Management Movement

The scientific management school placed special emphasis upon production. Their main pre-occupation was what to do in order to increase employee productivity so that the entrepreneur could realise enough revenue. Scientific management was intended to bring about “a complete mental revolution”, which must occur in the minds of the workmen and management.

3.2.1.1 Frederick Winston Taylor

Frederick W. Taylor is often referred to as the father of scientific management. According to Taylor:
Scientific management is not any efficient device, nor a device of any kind for securing efficiency; it is not a new system of figuring cost; it is not a new scheme of paying men, it is not a piece work system, it is not a bonus system; it is not a premium system, it is not a scheme for paying men; it is not holding a stopwatch on a man writing things down on him.
According to Taylor, the essence of scientific management is to:

1.  increase the output of the average employee, and 
2. improve the efficiency of management. 

He opines that each worker is motivated by financial need and that his tendency for restricting output is fear of replacement. To solve this, he advocates complete education of employees to the fact that their need for more money and job security can only be met by increased output at a low cost. He advocates placing workers on a piece work in order to encourage them to earn more.

3.2.1.2 Taylor’s Principles of Management

Taylor’s principles of management can be summarised thus:

1.  the gathering, analysis and codification of all “rule of thumb” and data existing in business 
2.  careful selection of employees and development of employees to enable them attain their optimum potential 
3. educating men on scientific method that has been tested and proved to be effective
4. management should reorganise these in order to carry out their duties properly. 

Thus, Taylor insists that management should not rely on tradition or intuition, but rather should subject every job to a critical analysis, inventive experiments and a thorough objective evaluation which he applied in the machine shop in order to attain best results. Taylor was criticised for his lack of humanitarian concept.

3.2.1.3 Charles Babbage

One of the forerunners of Frederick Taylor was Babbage who spent his life working on the “Difference Engine”, a project considered to be a forerunner of our modern data processing equipment. His major contributions to the field of management include the under listed

1. Division of labour and specialisation - He stressed the need for dividing and assigning labour on the basis of skill. He used pin production to illustrate the benefits of division of labour pointing out the savings in time and the acquisition of skill within a relatively short time as a person concentrates on only one operation. 
2.  Automatic operation - He stressed the need for replacing manual operations by automatic machinery. 

3.2.1.4 Frank Gilbreth

Gilbreth is known for his work on time and motion studies. His book Cheaper by the Dozen, made him very popular. Gilbreth believed that there was one best way which was believed to be the way that required the least motion.

He identified seventeen basic elements (listed below) in on-the-job motions which he called “Therblings” (Gilbreth spelt backwards).

1.  Search 
2.  Find 
3.  Select 
4. Grasp 
5.  Position 
6. Assemble 
7. Use 
8.  Disassemble 
9.  Inspect 
10.  Transport loaded, moving hand or body with a load 
11.  Pre-position 
12. Release load 
13.  Transport empty 
14. Wait-unavoidable 
15.  Wait-avoidable 
16.  Rest-necessary for overcoming fatigue, and 
17.  Plan. 

His other contribution was the development of a flow chart which highlighted the need for breaking an operation into units and steps for different employees to perform.

3.2.1.5 Henri Fayol’s Emphasis on Administration

The first principles of management were advocated by a French engineer and geologist - Henri Fayol. He isolated a set of principles that have been taught to other managers and students of management over the years. The 14 principles of management cover all aspects of management – human relations, scientific management as advocated by Babbage and Taylor. Fayol’s principles of management are as listed below.

1.  Division of labour 
2. Authority 
3. Discipline 
4. Unity of command 
5.  Unity of direction 
6. Subordination of the individual interest to the general interest 
7. Remuneration 
8.  Centralisation 
9.  Scalar chain (line authority) 
10.  Order 
11.  Equity 
12. Stability of tenure of personnel 
13.  Initiative 
14.  Esprit de corps. 

In the development of management concept over the years, no nation appears to have a monopoly. Charles Babbage and Frederick W. Taylor are from the United States of America; Robert Owen is Scottish, while George Elton Mayo is from Australia. They worked to find the best way of increasing the productivity of workers and improving their economic, social and psychological well being.

3.3 Modern Approaches to Management

After a scholarly review of management concept over the years, Harold Koontz in his article “The Management Theory Jungle” has classified the major “schools” of management into six broad areas as shown below.

1.  The management process 
2. Empirical school 
3. Human relations school 
4. Decision theory school 
5. Mathematical school. 

3.3.1 The Management Process School

This school of thought perceives management as a process of getting things done (through people), operating in organised groups. The management process school attempts to establish a conceptual framework, identify the principles and formulate a theory of management based on it. This group believes in the universality of management. He grouped Henri Fayol, and Frederick Taylor as belonging to the same school. This school, he believes, looks to the function of managers.

3.3.2 Empirical School

This is Koontz’s second classification. In this section are those who studied management through the analysis of the experience of successful managers. An attempt was made by examining the successful operation to form generalisation concerning the nature of management and the ability to apply the best management techniques. Ernest Dale, the great organiser typifies this group. The criticism for this school is in the area of the danger of using the past to judge the present or believing that what appeared to be right in the past may fit a situation in the present or future.

It could be argued that the empirical school is identical to the management process school. Taylor and Fayol were men with many years of practical experience on the job and what they postulated were based on their own experiences. Dale’s comparative approach is based on structure - with less of experience. Both aim at deriving concepts or principles to be used as a guide for the practice of management.

3.3.3 Human Relations School

This group concentrates on the interpersonal relationship between management and workers. This group places emphasis on the understanding of employees by management. It stresses motivation, meeting workers needs and aspirations. The school believes that effective use of human relationship will aid management in realising the organisational goals. The criticism for this school is that it tries to link management too loosely to the field of psychology and sociology. The study of group dynamics and interpersonal relationship is not limited to management

3.3.4 Decision Theory School

This group believes in rational decision-making. They perceive management as engaged in constant selection of courses of action from available alternatives. The group engages in the analysis of decision from varying viewpoints – the economic rationale of the decision, decision makers and psychological aspects of decisions and decision-making. Most of the members of this school are economists and they tailor their analysis to include utility maximisation, indifference curve, marginal curve and economic behaviour under uncertainty. They have broadened the area of decision-making to include every aspect of the organisation and all the factors that influence the enterprise.

3.3.5 Mathematical School

There is a class relationship between the mathematical school and the decision theory school. These people classify themselves as “management scientists”. They attempt to quantify some areas of management such as planning, decision-making and control in the form of mathematical symbols and models. In recent times, this field is called operations research. With the advent of computers, this school has gained recognition and has extended its activities to include simulation and game theories requiring sophisticated algebraic symbols and equations.

It can be seen from the above that this field is approached by many experts in different ways. As it has been pointed out, it is best to use the systems concept as a way of describing the total organisation rather than emphasising a specific function as enunciated by the various schools.

4.0 CONCLUSION

The discussion in this unit has taken us through the evolutionary process of management from the pre-industrial period through medieval, industrial revolution to modern-day management. You have also been exposed to the approaches to modern management and various schools of thought in management.

5.0 SUMMARY

In this unit, you have learnt the evolution of management theory, as well as the contributions of various management experts or practitioners to the development of management principles

6.0 TUTOR-MARKED ASSIGNMENT

1.  What are the major contributions of scientific management movement? 
2.  Write short notes on the following and show their relationship: 
3. division of labour 
4.  specialisation.