The models used can often be represented mathematically,
but sometimes computer-based, visual or verbal representations are used.
The range of problems and issues to which
management science has contributed insights and solutions is vast. It includes
scheduling airlines, both planes and crew, deciding the appropriate place to
site new facilities such as a warehouse or factory, managing the flow of water
from reservoirs, identifying possible future development paths for parts of the
telecommunications industry, establishing the information needs and appropriate
systems to supply them within the health service, and identifying and
understanding the strategies adopted by companies for their information
systems.
Management
by Objective (May'12, May’13, and Dec’12): Management
by Objectives is a process whereby superior and subordinate managers of an
Organization jointly define its common goals, define each individual's major
areas of responsibility in terms Of results expected of him and use these
measures as guides for operating the unit and assessing the contribution of
each of its members.
The process of setting objectives in the organization to give a sense of
direction to the employees is called as Management by Objectives.
It refers to the process of setting goals for the employees so that they
know what they are supposed to do at the workplace.
Management by Objectives defines roles and responsibilities for the
employees and helps them chalk out their future course of action in the
organization.
Management by objectives guides the employees to deliver their level
best and achieve the targets within the stipulated time frame.
Job
Evaluation (Nov’10):
A job evaluation is a
systematic way of determining the value/worth of a job in relation to other
jobs in an organization. It tries to make a systematic comparison between jobs
to assess their relative worth for the purpose of establishing a rational pay
structure.
Job evaluation needs
to be differentiated from job analysis. Job analysis is a systematic way of
gathering information about a job. Every job evaluation method requires at
least some basic job analysis in order to provide factual information about the
jobs concerned. Thus, job evaluation begins with job analysis and ends at that
point where the worth of a job is ascertained for achieving pay equity between
jobs.
Features
of Job evaluation: The purpose of job evaluation is to produce
a defensive ranking of jobs on which a rational and acceptable pay structure
can be built. The important features of job evaluation may be summarized thus:
1. It tries to assess jobs, not people.
2. The standards of job evaluation are
relative, not absolute.
3. The basic information on which job
evaluations are made is obtained from job analysis.
4. Job evaluations are carried out by
groups, not by individuals.
5. Some degree of subjectivity is always
present in job evaluation.
6. Job evaluation does not fix pay scales,
but merely provides a basis for evaluating a rational wage structure.
Job analysis (Nov’10): Job analysis:
Job analysis is the formal process of identifying the content of a job in terms
activities involved and attributes needed to perform the work and identifies
major job requirements. Job analysis was conceptualized by two of the founders
of industrial/organizational psychology, Frederick Taylor and Lillian Moller
Gilbreth in the early 20th century. Job analyses provide information to
organizations which helps to determine which employees are best fit for
specific jobs.
Purpose of Job analysis:
One of the main purposes of conducting job analysis is to prepare job
descriptions and job specifications which in turn help hire the right quality
of workforce into an organization. The general purpose of job analysis is to
document the requirements of a job and the work performed. Job and task
analysis is performed as a basis for later improvements, including: definition
of a job domain; description of a job; development of performance appraisals,
personnel selection, selection systems, promotion criteria, training needs
assessment, legal defense of selection processes, and compensation plans.
Job description (Nov’10): A
job description is a list that a person might use for general tasks, or
functions, and responsibilities of a position. It may often include to whom the
position reports, specifications such as the qualifications or skills needed by
the person in the job, or a salary range. Job descriptions are usually
narrative, but some may instead comprise a simple list of competencies; for
instance, strategic human resource planning methodologies may be used to
develop competency architecture for an organization, from which job
descriptions are built as a shortlist of competencies.
Creating a job description:
A job description is usually developed by conducting a job analysis, which
includes examining the tasks and sequences of tasks necessary to perform the
job. The analysis considers the areas of knowledge and skills needed for the
job. A job usually includes several roles.
Roles and responsibilities:
A job description may include relationships with other people in the
organization: Supervisory level, managerial requirements, and relationships
with other colleagues.
Goals: A job
description need not be limited to explaining the current situation, or work
that is currently expected; it may also set out goals for what might be
achieved in future.
Limitations:
Prescriptive job descriptions may be seen as a hindrance in certain
circumstances:
1. Job
descriptions may not be suitable for some senior managers as they should have
the freedom to take the initiative and find fruitful new directions;
2. Job
descriptions may be too inflexible in a rapidly-changing organization, for
instance in an area subject to rapid technological change;
3. Other changes
in job content may lead to the job description being out of date;
4. The process
that an organization uses to create job descriptions may not be optimal.
Management
of Objective (Dec’12):
The main objectives of management are
provides below:
1.
Getting Maximum Results with Minimum Efforts:
The main objective of management is to secure maximum outputs with minimum
efforts & resources. Management is basically concerned with thinking and
utilizing human, material and financial resources in such a manner that would
result in best combination. This combination results in reduction of various
costs.
2.
Increasing the Efficiency of factors of Production:
Through proper utilization of various factors of production. Their efficiency
can be increased to a great extent which can be obtained by reducing spoilage,
wastages and breakage of all kinds; this in turn leads to saving of time,
effort and money which is essential for the growth and prosperity of the enterprise.
3.
Maximum Prosperity for Employer & Employees:
Management ensures smooth and coordinated functioning of the enterprise. This
in turn helps in providing maximum benefits to the employee in the shape of
good working condition, suitable wage system, incentive plans on the one hand
and higher profits to the employer on the other hand.
4.
Human betterment & Social Justice:
Management serves as a tool for the organization as well as betterment of the
society. Through increased productivity & employment, management ensures
better standards of living for the society. It provides justice through its
uniform policies.
Mobile
Banking (Dec’12):
Mobile banking is a system that allows
customers of a financial institution to conduct a number of financial
transactions through a mobile device such as a mobile phone or personal digital
assistant.
Mobile banking differs to mobile
payment's which involves the use of a mobile device to pay for goods or
services either at the point of sale or remotely, analogously to the use of a
debit or credit card to effect an EFTPOS payment.
The earliest mobile banking services
were offered over SMS, a service known as SMS banking. With the introduction of
smart phones with WAP support enabling the use of the mobile web in 1999, the
first European banks started to offer mobile banking on this platform to their
customers. Mobile banking has until recently (2010) most often been performed
via SMS or the mobile web.
Strategic
Planning (Nov’10, Nov’11 and Nov’12): Strategic planning
determines where an organization is going over the next year or more, how it’s
going to get there and how it'll know if it got there or not. The focus of a
strategic plan is usually on the entire organization. While the focus of a
business plan is usually on a particular product, service or program.
There are a variety of perspectives,
models and approaches used in strategic planning. The way that a strategic plan
is developed depends on the nature of the organization's leadership, culture of
the organization, complexity of the organization's environment, size of the
organization, expertise of planners, etc.
For example: there are a variety of
strategic planning models, including goals-based, issues-based, organic,
scenario (some would assert that scenario planning is more of a technique than
model), etc.
1) Goals-based planning is probably
the most common and starts with focus on the organization's mission (and vision
and/or values), goals to work toward the mission, strategies to achieve the
goals and action planning (who will do what and by when).
2) Issues-based strategic planning
often starts by examining issues facing the organization, strategies to address
those issues and action plans.
3) Organic strategic planning might
start by articulating the organization's vision and values, and then action
plans to achieve the vision while adhering to those values. Some planners
prefer a particular approach to planning, e.g. appreciative inquiry.
Some, plans are scoped to one year,
many to three years and some to five to ten years into the future. Some plans
include only top-level information and no action plans. Some plans are five to
eight pages long, while others can be considerably longer.
Quite often, an organization's
strategic plan less already know much of what will go into a strategic plan
(this is true for business planning, too). However, development of the
strategic plan greatly helps to clarify the organization's plans and ensure that
key leaders are all "on the same script". Far more important than the
strategic plan document, is the strategic planning process itself.
Communication
Process (Dec’12):
Communication is a process of exchanging verbal
and non verbal messages. It is a continuous process. Pre-requisite of
communication is a message. This message must be conveyed through some medium
to the recipient. It is essential that this message must be understood by the
recipient in same terms as intended by the sender. He must respond within a
time frame. Thus communication is a two way process and is incomplete without a
feedback from the recipient to the sender on how well the message is understood
by him.
The
main components of communication process are as follows:
1.
Context: Communication is affected by the context
in which it takes place. This context may be physical, social, chronological or
cultural. Every communication proceeds with context. The sender chooses the
message to communicate within a context.
2.
Sender / Encoder: Sender / Encoder are a
person who sends the message. A sunder makes use of symbols (words or graphic,
or visual aids) to convey the message and produce the required response. For
instance, a training manager conducting training for new batch of employees.
Sender may be an individual or a group or an organization. The views,
background, approach, skills, competencies, and knowledge of the sender have a
great impact on the message. The verbal and non verbal symbols chosen are
essential in ascertaining interpretation of the message by the recipient in the
same terms as intended by the sender.
3.
Message: Message is a key idea that the sender
wants to communicate. It is a sign that elicits the response of recipient. Communication
process begins with deciding about the message to be conveyed. It must be
ensured that the main objective of the message is clear.
4.
Medium: Medium is a means used to-exchange /
transmits the message. The sender must choose an appropriate medium for
transmitting the message else the message might not be conveyed to the desired
recipients. The choice of appropriate medium of communication is essential for
making the message effective and correctly interpreted by the recipient. This
choice of communication medium varies depending upon the features of
communication. For instance - Written medium is chosen when a message has to be
conveyed to a small group of people, while an oral medium is chosen when
spontaneous feedback is required from the recipient as misunderstandings are
cleared then and there.
5.
Recipient / Decoder: Recipient / Decoder is
a person for whom the message is intended / aimed L targeted. The degree to
which the decoder understands the message is dependent upon various factors such
as knowledge of recipient, their responsiveness to the message, and the
reliance of' encoder on decoder.
6.
Feedback: Feedback is the main component of
communication process as it permits the sender to analyze the efficacy of the
message. It helps the sender in confirming the correct interpretation of
message by the decoder. Feedback may be verbal (through words) or non-verbal
(in form of smiles, sighs, etc.). It may take written form also in form of
memos reports, etc.
Industrial
Relations (Dec’12):
Industrial relations are a
multidisciplinary field that studies the employment relationship. Industrial relations
are increasingly being called employment relations or employee relations
because of the importance of non-industrial employment relationships: this move
is sometimes seen as further broadening of the human resource management trend.
Indeed, some authors now define human resource management as synonymous with
employee relations. Other authors see employee relations as dealing only with
non-unionized workers,
Where as labour relations are seen
as dealing with unionized workers. Industrial relations studies examine various
employment situations, not just ones with a unionized workforce. However,
according to Bnice E. Kaufman "To a large degree. Most scholars regard
trade unionism. Collective bargaining and labour-management relations, and the
national labour policy and labour law within which they are embedded, as the
core subjects of the field."
Initiated in the United States at
end of the 19th century, it took off as a field in conjunction with the New
Deal. However, it is generally a separate field of study only in
English-speaking countries, having no direct equivalent in continental Europe.
In recent times, industrial relations has been in decline as a field, in
correlation with the decline in importance 'of trade unions, and also with the
increasing preference of business schools for the human resource management
paradigm.
E-commerce (Dec’11): Electronic commerce, commonly known as e-commerce or e-com, is
the buying and selling of products or services over electronic systems such as the Internet and other computer networks. Electronic
commerce draws on such technologies as electronic
funds transfer, supply chain management, Internet marketing, online transaction processing, electronic data interchange
(EDI), inventory management systems and automated data collection
systems. Modern electronic commerce typically uses the World Wide Web at least at one point in the transaction's life-cycle,
although it may encompass a wider
range of technologies such as e-mail, mobile devices and telephones as well.
Management by Exception (Nov’11): Management
by Exception is a style of business management that focuses on identifying and
handling cases that deviate from the norm.
Practice whereby
only the information that indicates a significant deviation of actual results
from the budgeted or planned results is brought to the management's notice. Its
objective is to facilitate management's focus on really important tactical and
strategic tasks. In MBE (Management by Exception), the decision that cannot be
made at one level of management is passed on to the next higher level.
Management by
exception has both a general business application and a business intelligence
application. General business exceptions are cases that deviate from the normal
behaviour in a business process and need to be cared for in a unique manner,
typically by human intervention. Their cause might include: process deviation,
infrastructure or connectivity issues, external deviation, poor quality
business rules, malformed data, etc. Management by exception here is the
practice of investigating, resolving and handling such occurrences by using
skilled staff and software tools. Good management can contribute to efficiency
of business processes. Often in these cases the process will be called
exception management, as exceptional cases are not the sole focus of the
managerial policy, and exception management (as opposed to management by
exception) denotes a more moderate application of the process.
Inter-Branch Reconciliation (Nov’11): Inter-Branch
Reconciliation is an important back-office function for Banks and its
significance cannot be more emphasized in today's expanding world of banking.
As commercial activities and money involved grow in magnitude, co-ordination
between activities of all branches becomes a daunting task. With this in
perspective, it becomes important for banks to protect their assets. In case of
fraudulent or errors in transactions due to negligence, a good Bank
Reconciliation system helps detect them. Once identified, the errors can be rectified
or at the very least, short-circuit the progression of losses.
Therefore, it
becomes imperative to have an efficient and robust IBR system, which can handle
high volume of data with accuracy and also with an inbuilt flexibility to
handle exceptions.
Performance appraisal/ merit-rating or
performance evaluation (Nov’10):
Merit Rating:
Performance appraisal, merit-rating or performance evaluation is one of the
most important functions of personnel management! People differ in their
abilities and aptitudes. The personnel management should know these differences
to develop various development programmes in the organisation to have an
efficient work force. Merit rating technique has been evolved to know the
relative worth of the employee-quantitatively and qualitatively -on the job, in
comparison to other fellow workers. Merit rating is used for measuring the
merit or performance of an employee and comparing it with that of others in the
same group. According to Flippo — "Merit-rating is a systematic, periodic
and, so far as humanly possible, an impartial rating of an employee's
excellence in matters pertaining to his present job and to his potentialities
for a job.
According to
Denyer, "Merit rating is an assessment according to individual ability
which may be rewarded by additional payments to the ordinary rates of pay for
the different job". According to Yoder, performance appraisal refers to
all formal procedures used in working organisations to evaluate personalities
and contributions and potential of group members". Thus merit-rating is a
systematic evaluation by the supervisor or some qualified person of an
individual worker's performance. The process of merit-rating starts at the time
of recruitment and continues throughout the life of an employee in an organization.
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