Management Theory Essay

Words: 2097
Pages: 9

Robbins, Bergman, Stagg and Coulter (2006, p. 11) state “The continued popularity of the functional and process approaches to describe what managers do is a tribute to their clarity and simplicity- managers plan, organize, lead and control.” Compare and contrast how the ideas of Fayol and Mintzberg relate to this statement. In your discussion you should refer to a minimum of academic journal articles and also identify and indicate you understand underlying these ideas.

The following essay will compare and contrast the ideas of Fayol and Mintzberg relating to management which have been developed to assist a manger to complete their job of working with and through others so that organisations can achieve goals and objectives efficiently
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As the classical functions, other scholars must compare their views with each other. Lamond (2003, p.18) cites Wren (1994, p.357) suggests that “the work of Fayol and Mintzberg represent simply different rather than competing views”. And Carroll and Gillen(1987, p.40) cited Mohoney, Jerdee and Carroll(1963, 1965) who indicate that “managerial time can be allocated to a set of eight basic managerial functions which can be called the ‘PRINCESS’ factors (Planning, Representing, Investigating, Negotiating, Coordinating, Evaluating, Supervising, Staffing)”, because Carroll and Gillen(1987, p.40) considers that Fayol’s five functions do not involve managerial work activities such as “represetnting the organization to outside groups”, which is also pointed out by Mintzberg (1971). Moreover, Lamond (2003, p.13) cites Mintzberg (1973, p.10) argues that Fayol’s five functions are useless for not linking to specific activities. In addition, Parker and Riston (2005, p.186) cites Mintzberg (1994, p. 186) has argued that “the untenability of planning’s view of change is exemplified by Fayol’s view of planning’s role in maintaining organizational stability, allegedly admitting only adaptation to ‘minor perturbations rather than major discontinuities’”. At the same time, Parker and Riston (2005, p.186) use again Mintzberg (1994) to critique “the inflexibility of Fayol’s approach to planning was