Trends towards Managerial Revolution in India!
Some factors like size and activities, market conditions, capital investment, innovation and need for productivity determine the extent of load for the top management.
Harbison and Myers have analysed these factors to show how the intensity of managerial abilities is determined by each of them. When load for the top management increases, it will have to depend more and more on the technical and managerial skills of the employees instead of its own directives.
The top management begins to depend on the capabilities of its managers and delegates appropriate authority with suitable measures for co-ordination and control. The more common is the framework of direction and policy. This action will be revolutionary, depending on the quantum of authority, previously withheld and now given, and in the sense of effectiveness the managers will get.
If the movement of authority towards professional manager becomes a general trend in the business world of a country as a whole, there is little doubt that it will be a feature of managerial revolution which can also be seen from the measures the top management takes for direction.
When the circumstances of business put in the hands of managers, more and more power in a series of development will take place within an organisation by deliberate efforts of the top management:
1. Staff specialists are appointed to get advice and suggestions so that top management can guide and direct the activities of the managers.
2. A level of middle executives are created to be accountable to the operative managers and to diffuse power from the latter.
3. Policies and codification of rules are made known throughout the organisation so that each executive knows his responsibilities in the context of his position in the hierarchy.
Since these measures are taken when the top management has a feeling that power has already been shifted or is in the process of being shifted to professional managers, they also give indication of the emergence of the trends of managerial revolution.
The revolution does not suggest that professional managers cannot have any ownership stake in business which they serve, although such an ownership may in some case bring conflicts between business practices and the national goals.
Trends towards Managerial Revolution in India:
Many are of the opinion that a process of revolution has already started in Indian Management. Its characteristics are visible in the attitude of the top management in both the public and private sectors.
Indian business consists of large, medium sized and small enterprises, with different kinds of ownership like proprietary, partnership, joint stock companies and government. Indian management generally refers those persons who are incharge of a big enterprise.
The managerial revolution in the short ran is seen to be in the process of making a breakthrough in the bigger industries, although ultimately industries of other sizes will also face situation requiring many managerial adjustments.
Sound business practices are not expected only from big industries but also from business as a part of society. Managerial revolution is of great significance to all in business.
Gap between authority and managerial skills:
Managerial revolution cannot come about without there being changes in the methods, techniques, control and organisation. Looking into the volume of changes and the quickness with which the changes are being made in the methods of production, Indian business can be said to be going through ail industrial revolution.
The collaboration with foreign companies, presence of foreign experts and the appointment of technologists and engineers are the favourable factors in the process of changes.
In most enterprises, the top management consists of members who are either pro-changer or no-changers. In reality Indian organisations have traditional methods of controls in that the professional managers do not have much voice in policy formulation, and the control over policies is exercised from the top with the help of codification of rules, comprehensive organisation charts to indicate relationships, and assignment of responsibilities but without establishing a corresponding decentralisation of information for decision-making.
Complexities of business operations:
The job of industrial management in India has become much more complex today than what it was a few years ago. Horizontal and vertical developments of industrial units with decentralised features have given rise to problems of assessment of situation, problems of operational command, limitations of leadership and many other organisational problems.
There are problems of morale and incentives, of sales and profit, of needs of rationalisation and replacement of obsolete machinery. The Indian management notices the impact of complexities of business operations on organisational and human behaviour.
The top management has begun to realise its limitation in continuing with centralised control. To avoid management crises and as measure of stability, it has started giving more responsibilities with corresponding authority to managers at higher level.
Increasing number of managers:
A significant growth in the number of professional managers is a forerunner of managerial revolution; now-a-days more and younger persons are taking right type of education and training for career in business.
It is, however, not the number of managers which will be a factor of managerial revolution in India but the acceptance on the part of employers of democratic ideology to make managers feel individually responsible. The increasing number of professional managers gives an indication of this acceptance. Another positive step is that management’s attitude has become less rigid, and that managers are able to develop constructive relationship with top management.
Interest in management development:
The confidence of the employers and top management in Indian business to see that managers can achieve competence to shoulder higher responsibilities is very sincere and strong. It can be seen from enrolment in the agencies, conducting programmes of management development.
Although top management has accepted the need for management development, it has not done much in a planned & systematic manner. The greatest shortcoming of a managerial development programme is the focus on the development of individual managers and not on the development of managers as a team.
Executive Mobility:
The executive mobility which was totally missing in India some years ago has already begun giving anxieties or reliefs to the management. It has come due to self confidence of a manager in his ability acquired through further training and education.
The chief aim of executive mobility is for more freedom of action by managers and to contribute to the economic advancement of the country. The trend of manager’s mobility is also an indication that enlightened employers will allow for more and more managerial freedom where it deserves.
Use of social skills:
Indian managers have been using social and foreign skills in their practices. They often do not get good results from the social skills and techniques of the west in analysing Indian problems. Managerial skills in handling people are still to be developed.
The social skills based on the contribution of behavioural scientists in the U.S.A. may not have universal application. The Indian problems can be understood by examining western experience, appropriate Indian solutions which might be quite different from those of the U.S.A.
The challenge before the young professional managers is to demonstrate by their action the efficacy of modern social skill in their own functional areas.
A rare force which is compelling some .organisations towards managerial revolution is the increasing participation by top management in activities outside an enterprise. Contact with bankers, share brokers, business leaders and underwriters for raising funds by issuing shares can only be maintained effectively by the top management.
It also spends a lot of time in discussion with departmental heads and staff executives to understand problems of the operating areas. Without this understanding direction and co-ordination are not possible.
The top management is decreasing some of its workload through delegation of authority to its next level of management. In few cases, the delegation has gone down to the second line of command.