Management Theories free essay sample

This essay presents several management theories and ideas which can be seen in the Vascellaro article. They include Fayol’s four managerial functions, some ideas about levels of management, Mintzberg’s managerial roles, and challenges for management in the general and global environments, especially achieving a competitive advantage. The essay concludes by considering the implications of Ms Decker’s plan for Yahoo! ’s staff. Managerial functions, levels of management Ms Susan Decker, the president of Yahoo! , will soon unveil a new ‘operational blueprint. ’ A blueprint is a plan or model, so by definition this is part of the planning function. Because the change is a large one – it involves the whole organisation – it is not surprising that it involves the top levels of management. The plan involves centralising the accounting functions of the company’s web services. This relates to the organising function in Yahoo! : we would expect to see more central control of employees who carry out accounting tasks if Ms Decker’s plan goes ahead. We will write a custom essay sample on Management Theories or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page Because Ms Decker must ‘sell the plan to employees’ we can regard her as carrying out the function of leading, because leaders have to present a vision or idea to their organisation. The organising function appears again with the mention of the ‘internal shake-up’: the reporting relationships in Yahoo! are being changed ‘to restore confidence’. Presumably Ms Decker believes that new staff rather than the present executives would do a better job of putting her new plan in place. As well, several senior staff (three vice-presidents and several other executives) are leaving, so this means Yahoo will need to allocate their work to other people. The controlling function is not mentioned directly, but at the end of the article we are told that ‘the investment community’ would like to be more confident that Yahoo! has ‘devise[d] new ways to strengthen its brand against Google and to compete for consumers’ increasingly fragmented attention online’. This would require working out exactly how to monitor Yahoo! ’s performance against these goals, but it is not clear from the article what these evaluation mechanisms would be. Mintzberg’s management roles Mintzberg would regard Ms Decker’s development of new web services as part of the entrepreneurial role, since it is a major new project for Yahoo. In addition, ‘selling the plan to staff’ relates to Mintzberg’s ‘spokesperson’ role, and the ‘organisational shake-up’ relates to the ‘resource allocator’ role, because staff have to be assigned to specific projects. If Ms Decker needs to deal with negative perceptions of the investment community, she would be carrying out the ‘disturbance handler’ role. Challenges for management in a global environment Yahoo! is a global company: it operates and competes in more than one country. However the article makes it clear that Yahoo! has had difficulty achieving a competitive advantage against its major competitor, Google. To use the definition given in Waddell et al. (2007: 21-22), Yahoo! is so far not able to ‘produce desired goods or services more efficiently and effectively’ than that particular competitor. Waddell et al. (p. 22) say that the four building blocks of competitive advantage are ‘superior efficiency; quality; speed, flexibility and innovation; and responsiveness to customers’. Yahoo! ’s latest strategy, devising new web services which would appeal to different regions worldwide, appears to be aimed at ‘responsiveness to customers’, and also ‘innovation’, since the regional focus would differentiate Yahoo! ’s web services from Google’s. The organisation’s environment Waddell et al. 2007: 58) say that resources in the organisational environment ‘include the raw materials and skilled people that an organisation requires to produce goods and services’. Several skilled executives have already left Yahoo! , and there are fears that more will leave, so Yahoo! is clearly having difficulty keeping its skilled human resources. Conclusions and implications The article gives good insights into Yahoo’ s situation in its broader environment, the management roles being carried out by its president, and the four management functions at a general level. It does not discuss how Yahoo! ’s employees feel about the changes. However because some are leaving, it is likely that at least some of the remaining employees may be concerned about whether they will also lose their jobs. Even if they stay, they may be worried about having to do the work of their former colleagues. Some may be concerned about the extra work and responsibility, and others may be worried about whether they have the necessary training. All this could give Google, Yahoo! s main competitor, an opportunity to recruit these unhappy staff or the staff who have already left the company. Yahoo! ’s CEO should discuss with the president of its human resource department how to manage this difficult situation.

Food Safety Considered

Food Safety ConsideredA critique of the FDA's blatant failure on food.sat, its fine quality control standards, makes many people wonder about the agency's level of importance for consumer protection. Most consumers are familiar with this sad story of Food.sat's questionable recall of chicken and milk products. But it's far from the only recall the FDA has encountered.Consider the now infamous New England Clam, a delicacy that has been banned in New England and could never have been widely known had it not been for a mislabeled product, the FDA says. Although the agency is particularly proud of this Food.sat recall, it has also been involved in the recall of small quantities of baby food, doughnuts, fruit drinks, ice cream, cookies, chocolate, frozen dinners, infant formula, nuts, frozen entrees, salad dressings, teas, trail mix, yogurt, sauces, and vegetables. And more recently, pasta, breads, and rolls.Because the entire incident over the flap about a New England clam pizza will sur ely remain a blot on the agency's reputation, let me review the news story for a moment. The pizza was mistakenly identified as made with clams instead of clams. When the FDA realized the mistake, it quickly contacted the manufacturer, who in turn quickly recalled the product. Consumer outrage notwithstanding, the whole incident highlights the problem with Food.sat's track record.This underscores another point: the FDA is so busy regulating all kinds of food products that it has neglected to properly regulate food ingredients and food packaging. This is especially disturbing considering the large number of grocery store shelves filled with seemingly 'fresh' foods (some label them 'prepared') which contain potentially harmful preservatives and additives. The story of Food.sat's food recalls may be instructive for those concerned about their own food consumption. By the FDA's own account, it can't keep up with the rising volume of recall calls.The FDA's incompetence in this area is so mewhat understandable because the food industry is highly regulated. So, Food.sat is expected to play by their rules, and the typical foods it is expected to inspect are nearly exclusively those that are consumed by the public. This means that the Food.sat inspectors will be exposed to many of the same foods we all eat every day, and that food ingredients will frequently cross paths. If they don't, they are usually caught by the processor and labeled appropriately.But there is a huge problem with Food.sat's inspection practice, in my opinion. Inspectors rarely try to recreate the food in a laboratory environment or other controlled situation, because the samples are so abundant.What a Food.sat inspector sees on a supermarket shelf will hardly bear close resemblance to what they observe in a laboratory, and Food.sat's inspectors do not have the time, knowledge, or resources necessary to properly replicate every aspect of food production and testing. It would take months for an inspec tor to examine each batch of grocery store food. There are simply too many variables to be able to accurately recreate a given food. Because of this, the Food.sat inspectors are forced to rely on guesswork when they issue recall calls.The FDA is able to evaluate all possible risks and dangers posed by a food item, but because the agency lacks the staff and resources to properly test ingredients, the firm's ability to identify and eliminate such hazards becomes completely meaningless. To put it simply, the Food.sat recall is not proof that the FDA is incompetent. It is proof that the FDA has lost its way. If we want to protect our health and the public, the Food.sat recall should be just the beginning of a more focused Food.sat.