okay, so socrates is more at home with management functions than aristotle. Never the less, his take on logic was enough to drive me nuts as an undergrad - that one has the time to dissect an argument to such a degree that a whole new field of study can be built around it tells me somebody wasn't stopping the smell the flowers nearly enough....and lo these many centuries later, we're all paying for it and lawyers are getting rich because of it. But I digress....
Henri Fayol, like aristotle and the great navel gazing scheme he championed, spent a good deal of his life running a mining facility only to up and decide that the world would somehow be a better place if he could break down what it was that he was doing as a manager in a mining facility. (I guess therapy wasn't available at the turn of the century) Thus was born 14 redundant functions of management. Thank God clearer heads prevailed over time and beat down 14 into a mere 5 functions: staffing, controlling, planning, organizing, and fainting, I mean, leading (and if you give them to Prof. Carrigan out of order, as I just did, shame on you - if they're in the book one way, they must be regurgitated exactly the same way - there's no room for individuality or free-thought in management, dammit). Forget that even these 5 functions are redundant in some fashion....but then, newer gurus on the scene heard my cries of boredom and have thus decided only 4 functions should do. Whatever. I'll start listening when we're down to the only function that matters: common sense. But I digress again.......
Of course, it's not enough to have five functions, no, we must also have roles! Enter another man with too much time on his hands - Mintzberg. Actually, it was the 1970's - he probably needed a dissertation topic more than the navel gazing of yore. Anyway, he picks 10 roles then, being the brilliant mind he is/was, breaks those down even further into three friggin categories: interpersonal, informational, and desicional. Now, don't you feel like a better manager already? More than the 5 traditional functions, these roles really got tongues wagging - lo and behold, they're like some sick vin diagram with overlapping roles, lions, and tigers, and bears, OH MY!
Where are my damn ruby slippers, Toto? Take me back to Kansas...there is no intelligent life here. Or maybe it's just me that needs to smell a few more flowers.
Henri Fayol, like aristotle and the great navel gazing scheme he championed, spent a good deal of his life running a mining facility only to up and decide that the world would somehow be a better place if he could break down what it was that he was doing as a manager in a mining facility. (I guess therapy wasn't available at the turn of the century) Thus was born 14 redundant functions of management. Thank God clearer heads prevailed over time and beat down 14 into a mere 5 functions: staffing, controlling, planning, organizing, and fainting, I mean, leading (and if you give them to Prof. Carrigan out of order, as I just did, shame on you - if they're in the book one way, they must be regurgitated exactly the same way - there's no room for individuality or free-thought in management, dammit). Forget that even these 5 functions are redundant in some fashion....but then, newer gurus on the scene heard my cries of boredom and have thus decided only 4 functions should do. Whatever. I'll start listening when we're down to the only function that matters: common sense. But I digress again.......
Of course, it's not enough to have five functions, no, we must also have roles! Enter another man with too much time on his hands - Mintzberg. Actually, it was the 1970's - he probably needed a dissertation topic more than the navel gazing of yore. Anyway, he picks 10 roles then, being the brilliant mind he is/was, breaks those down even further into three friggin categories: interpersonal, informational, and desicional. Now, don't you feel like a better manager already? More than the 5 traditional functions, these roles really got tongues wagging - lo and behold, they're like some sick vin diagram with overlapping roles, lions, and tigers, and bears, OH MY!
Where are my damn ruby slippers, Toto? Take me back to Kansas...there is no intelligent life here. Or maybe it's just me that needs to smell a few more flowers.
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