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Text 15 Managerial knowledge, skills and performance

Managers need a sound knowledge base and key management skills in order to develop work agendas, act out roles, and engage in planning, organizing, leading, and controlling activities. Although managers often switch companies and work in different industries, they are apt to run into difficulties if they don't have a reasonably extensive knowledge base relevant to their particular managerial job. A knowledge base can include information about an industry and its technology, company policies and practices, company goals and plans, company culture, the personalities of key organization members, and important suppliers and customers.

In addition to having a knowledge base, managers need three key types of skills to carry out the various functions of management. A skill is the ability to engage in a set of behaviors that are functionally related to one another and that lead to a desired performance level in a given area. For managers, the three key skill types are technical, human, and conceptual.

Technical skills are skills that reflect both an understanding of and a proficiency in a specialized field. For example, a manager may have technical skills in a specialized field such as accounting, finance, engineering, manufacturing, or computer science. pursuit of organizational goals.

Conceptual skills are skills related to the ability to visualize the organization as a whole, discern interrelationships among organizational parts, and understand how the organization fits into the wider context of the industry, community, and world. Managers need to recognize these various elements and understand the complex relationships among them so that they can take actions that advance the goals of the organization.

Conceptual skills, coupled with technical skills, human skills, and a knowledge base, are important ingredients in organizational performance.

What constitutes high performance in an organization? Performance actually is made up of two important dimensions: effectiveness and efficiency.

Effectiveness is the ability to choose appropriate goals and achieve them. Effectiveness, then, has two parts. First, goals must be appropriate. Second, goals must be reached.

In contrast, efficiency is the ability to make the best use of available resources in the process of achieving goals.

In essence, organizations need to exhibit both effectiveness (doing the right things) and efficiency (doing things right) in order to be good performers.

 

Exercises to Text 15

1) Answer the questions:

1 Why is a knowledge base important to managers?

2 Why do managers need to carry out the various functions of management?

3 What does a skill mean?

4 What skills are associated with a manager's ability to work well with others?

5 What is the difference between effectiveness and efficiency in organizational performance?

2) Write in English the definitions to the following terms:

· knowledge base;

· technical skills;

· conceptual skills;

· effectiveness;

· efficiency.

3) Write a brief summery of the text (100-150 words) and retell it.

 

 


Date: 2015-12-18; view: 1670


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