Chapter 8- Management Activities of Planning, Organising and Controlling Flashcards
What is planning?
Planning means clearly setting out the goals for the organisation and how these are to be achieved
What is a SWOT analysis?
A SWOT analysis is a management technique used to assess a business in terms of its strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats
What are mission statements?
Mission statements are short but precise one or two sentence statements used by companies to summarise “who we are, what we do, and where we’re headed”
What is a strategic plan?
A strategic plan (or corporate plan) refers to the long-term plan for the whole business. It normally covers five or more years
What are tactical plans?
Tactical plans break general strategic plan down into shorter, more specific and manageable steps. Usually of one or two-year periods
What are operational plans?
Operational plans are short-term plans that set targets for weeks or months ahead
What are contingency plans?
Contingency plans are special plans prepared to cope with emergencies or unexpected circumstances
What are the qualities of a good plan?
Specific, Measurable, Agreed, Realistic and Timed
Why is planning important to management?
Helps to identify internal strengths, weaknesses, new opportunities, threats and sets out clear targets, assists leadership and motivation and provides the necessary information to the investors
What is organising?
Organising means bringing people and resources together effectively to implement plans.
What does organising do?
Organising identifies the work to be done, creates and suitable organisation structure, identifies who will do what tasks and maintain a clear chain or command
What do organisational structure do?
Organisational (or management) structures identify the different departments and management functions in an organisation
Name the traditional types of organisational structure
Functional, Product, Geographic, matrix/ team based
What is a functional structure?
A functional structure divides a business into different departments according to the management functions of marketing, production, human resources and finance
What are the advantages of functional structures?
Builds up staff skills and expertise and provides clear promotional paths
What are the disadvantages of functional structures
Employees can get focused on their own departmental goals and communications between departments can be slow and subject to misunderstandings
What is product organisational structure?
A product structure organises a business on the basis of the products it makes
What are the advantages of product structures?
They improve communications, allows businesses to adapt different products more easily in response to customers needs and allows each division to focus on its own custoemrs
What is a geographic organisational structure?
A geographic structure divides the organisation according to the geographical markets it serves
What are the advantages of geographic structures?
Staff are better able to meet local customer needs and can encourage healthy competition between different regions
What are the disadvantages of geographic structures?
It can result in wasteful duplication of resources and lack of co-ordination between divisions if not properly controlled by management
What are matrix/team-based organisation structure?
Matrix (or team-based) structures are a type of organisation structure where staff are brought together into teams to achieve a clearly stated team goal, such as launching a new product
What are the main characteristics of successful team management?
Self-managing, responsibilities delegated and input into decision-making
What are the advantages of team-based/matrix structures?
Synergies, efficiency, better relationship and motivation
What are the disadvantages of team-based/matrix?
Two bosses and training costs
