Influence of Classical and Human Relations Approaches in Management Today
Considering the productivity and viability exhibited by the specialists building Babel Tower (Holy Bible, Genesis 11: 1-9), it’s fair to say that Management concept is indeed dated to ancient times.
Management is the process of dealing with or controlling things or people. (Online Oxford Dictionary)
The great ancient projects of the world which includes the great Pyramids of Egypt and others, were built by people who clearly applied management principles in order to accomplish them.
Classical management theories, come as a reaction to industrial revolution in the late 1700, where there was a rapid change in the way people worked, big expansion of big factories, machinery invention and transportation industry booming. This has created new issues.
(Business.com) It was in the early 1920’s that the human relations theory gained visibility, during the industrial revolution. It was a business focused time and Professor Elton Mayo began his experiments (Hawthorne Studies), to contradict with focusing on men as machine, but rather how important humans were important to company productivity.
This work has been created to critically evaluate Classical approach as well as Human approach in today’s management.
- Classical Approach
The beginning of the 20th Century is given to be the birth of management as science.
The emergence of the Classic Management Approach is mainly due to the advent of the Industrial Revolution. With it, organizations have experienced a quick and muddled development, requiring in this way an action that tended to the business issues more logical and less extemporized path, as was done in the past.
Another vital factor is that with the expansion of organizations and unpredictability of their organization and in addition the development of rivalry, the look for approaches to enhance the effectiveness of associations has turned into the control in the period.
Tasks division and positions, and the steady need to decrease expenses and waste have made the investigations created by Taylor and Fayol so exceptional those days.
- Frederick Taylor (Scientific Management)
Frederick Taylor around 1903, showed the requirement for institutionalization of time and movement, separation of duties, compensations and others, for which was labeled the father of efficiency and productivity.
Along the way, different researchers, for example, Henry Fayol (1916), Elton Mayo (1932) and Max Webber (1940), thought of new research tending to various factors of an association, for example, structure and individuals. In any case, the proficiency and productiveness question continued on and close by with them the pith of Taylor’s work, being conveyed for ages till introduce day times.
Consequently, it is fascinating to break down the real importance of this spearheading examination of regulatory schools, for associations, regardless of whether the beneficial area of merchandise or administrations.
It isn’t conceivable nowadays to envision, for instance, an auto generation business venture aside from a sequential construction system, division of work, creation premium, even with all the innovative know-how accessible.
Frederick W. Taylor, who was born in the United States, turned into the character that most impacted the exploration of the organization, being in a situation to be conversely with Thomas Edson and Henry Ford, for their top-notch cooperation of advance. The child of an unyielding family was at one time the first to think about justification and effectivity at work, cycle 1903. In actuality, this justification is nothing more prominent than the redesign of work systems went for developing profitability, which is the most gainful method for attempting to the present day. Taylor started his work in an industry as a worker with a specific end goal to look at and secure the working of procedures, and accordingly propose advancements (STONER AND FREEMAN, 1999).
Taylor accepted and thusly proposed the production of an art of administration. For him, it is feasible to take after comprehension to work. It is possible to optimize production through a single best way to produce and achieve maximum efficiency.
For this, only the work should be studied, the human being was disregarded in his studies. His focus has always been the technology of processes, not people. His study came at a very auspicious time, by the abundance of cheap and disqualified labor, by the almost absence of labor laws and trade unions; by the appearance of automobile industries and growth of the others that enjoyed great economic power.
The emphatic participation of the worker was focused only on the result and not on the process to reach it. The worker needed to know what to do and not how to do it. For this very reason, Taylorism has always been considered inhuman, which does not take into account the individual need of the worker but has it as a part of a system.
Taylor understood that the worker has the function of working only, and that what separates the function of the manager of the worker is that the manager must think and plan, and worker, would not have to be intelligent, it would be enough to obey and get the job done. As in the Charles Chaplin movie – (Modern Times), living alienated was not at all unworthy for Taylor. From that time onwards, there was a tendency to distinguish between the functions of management and execution.
Taylor’s studies indicate that managers what the laborer work was and therefore they accepted the levels of production they had. Some adopted solutions to the problems of unprepared management, disqualified workers, control and incentives were:
- Management awareness of the work of the worker;
- Selection and training;
- Planning and Control of Works;
- Adoption of incentives, considering the salary as the only incentive. The man would choose his work not by its content, but by the corresponding salary.
The influence of his studies, was not only in the industry but also in public and private life of all companies. He has always emphasized the pursuit of productivity efficiency with an emphasis on tasks. Therefore, everything that has to do with the maximization of resources, uniformity and standardization, work in less time and without waste is learned with Taylor.
Despite Taylor’s model of organization at that time, being the pioneer of productivity efficiency was also the one who paved the way for other organizational variables, which generated a series of criticisms of Taylor’s organizational model such as:
- The use of the timer, disregarding the individual factors and the subjective factors that interfere in the work;
- The specialization of the worker, making him alienated, prevented from having a global view of production, besides being monotonous and repetitive;
- Disqualification and dehumanization of the worker.
Critics point him out as a lackey of capital, interested exclusively in extracting the maximum from the worker, since the one who defends him considers him a humanist, concerned with the reduction of fatigue at work, trying to find a better way to perform his tasks.
The pressures created by the competitiveness of the globalization made prioritize the pursuit of in companies, as a matter of survival. Today, the paradox “the worker does not have to be intelligent, just obey and do” go along with companies, only they do not want more employees who just execute and don’t think. Each one has to be autonomous of its function, one has to think strategically, tactically and operationally. Taylor’s contributions are very present in the life of the companies, after all. So, what about the computerized assembly line robots today? Would not this be the quest for greater productivity in a shorter time and why not say with a better use without waste? At the moment we are living, Taylor remains current. In fact, Taylor is the father of all automation processes. However, much of Taylor’s mechanical and repetitive work has been criticized, he is still present in many large organizations because of his productive potential. The fact is that while criticisms of Taylor’s scientific management have arisen, he remains current and no model has yet been found to replace his methods.
- Henry Fayol (Administrative Management)
The Classic Theory of Management was inspired by Henry Fayol. It is portrayed by method of highlighting on authoritative structure, the vision of Economic Man and the idea of max productivity. It has been scrutinized as the control of laborers by means of material and wage motivations and the unreasonable concordance of command and duty. Parallel to the research of Frederick Taylor, Henri Fayol embraced practically identical thoughts in Europe, based essentially in his experience in senior administration.
While Taylor’s strategies had been examined by methods for European administrators, the supporters of the Scientific Management exclusively quit overlooking Fayol’s work when it was published in USA.
The protract in the enormous dissemination of Fayol’s thoughts gathered that mammoth citizens of authoritative idea were unconscious of their Basic Principles.
Fayol related 14 fundamental rules that can be examined integrally to those of Taylor:
1 – Work Division – Specialization of representatives from the apex of the chain of importance to assembling office laborers, subsequently supporting assembling proficiency with the guide of developing efficiency.
2 – Authority and responsibility – Authority is the privilege of bosses to give arranges that will hypothetically be complied. Obligation is the partner of specialist.
3 – Command unit – A specialist need to take orders from exclusively one supervisor, fighting off requests.
4 – Management unit – The single control is made plausible by utilizing the product of a chart for a group of exercises with similar destinations.
5 – Discipline – The need to build up principles of conduct and work that are genuine for all representatives. Absence of train makes disarray in the association.
6 – Prevalence of ordinary interests – The long-established interests of the business ought to be triumphant over individual interests.
7 – Remuneration – It must be adequate to guarantee the joy of workers and the association itself.
8 – Centralization – The essential activities of the business and its power should be brought together.
9 – Hierarchy – Unconditional assurance of the various leveled structure, regarding entirely a line of settled specialist.
10 – Order – Must be kept up in every association, protecting a place for each perspective and each factor in its place.
11 – Equity – Justice should be triumphant in each association, defending the unwaveringness and commitment of every specialist to the organization.
12 – Stability of representatives – High turnover has awful punishments on association general execution and specialist resolve.
13 – Initiative – It should be comprehended as the ability to build up an outline and stick to it.
14 – Team Spirit – Work ought to be set, encouraged by utilizing discussion inside the group. Individuals from the indistinguishable gathering need to be class-cognizant, to protect their motivations.
Based on the vision of the company from management perspective, Fayol focused his research on the unity of command, authority and responsibility.
Because of this, it is seen as obsessed with the command. The company as a closed system – Once planning is defined as the cornerstone of business management, it is hard to imagine that the organization is seen as an isolated part of the environment. Manipulation of workers – as well as the Scientific Management, had been considered biased, developing principles that sought to exploit workers. This was a basic outline of management in Fayol’s view.
- Max Weber (Bureaucracy)
Bureaucratic theory emerged in clear opposition to its predecessors, the Classical Theory and Human Relations Theory. The first was criticized for its excess mechanisms and the second for its naive romanticism.
Max Weber’s theory was striking in his day and is to this day, in view of its pioneering spirit. In this way, several further investigations refer to Max Weber’s Theory of Bureaucracy or to rely on it, or to criticize it. It is important to stress, too, that Max Weber’s theory of bureaucracy has some features more connected to sociology than administration itself.
The bureaucratic Weber hypothesis is a sort of human association in light of reasonability, ie, the methods must be built up and broke down totally formal and generic way keeping in mind the end goal to accomplish the expected reason. Therefore, in bureaucratic hypothesis there is an extraordinary accentuation on proficiency. Studies demonstrate that the soonest hints of administration have emerged in classical times, with implicit rules and standardization of conduct amongst state and populace. In any case, for Weber, the administration as we probably unaware it has its inceptions connected to the religious changes that happened after the Renaissance. Max Weber found that the cutting edge beneficial framework, ordinarily judicious and industrialist, had as its developing life the arrangement of good standards of the supposed Protestant ethic, which lectured the clique of diligent work, investment funds and the use of surplus creation. lectured the faction of diligent work, reserve funds and the utilization of surplus creation.
Bureaucratic relationships are typically authoritarian. The subordinates accept the orders of their superiors to admit the idea that such orders are supported by norms and legal precepts. In this way, obedience derives not from any person in itself, but from the set of norms and regulations established and accepted as legitimate by all.
In a broader sense, the very relationship of the people with their rulers is based on bureaucratic precepts. The people accept the laws as legitimate because they believe that they were elaborated in a sort of cooperation between the population itself and its political representatives.
All the administrative sphere, mainly in public service, is to replicate the will of the political ideology in force. Officials, or bureaucrats, must act in a manner strictly foreseen in the rules and regulations that govern them. Norms and regulations are created by Politicians. This conception, more clearly linked to sociology than to administration.
In conclusion, every administrative organization of a bureaucratic system is made in such a way as to reflect the political will of a group of people, it is never totally impersonal.
In common sense, bureaucracy is usually viewed from a pejorative standpoint. When one speaks of bureaucracy, one usually associates the idea of a great accumulation of documentary papers and of procedures almost always seen as unnecessary. In fact, this is the dysfunction of bureaucracy, that is, a defect in the bureaucratic system, but it is not the system itself. In Max Weber’s Theory of Bureaucracy, the concept is completely different. The administration prizes for the full proficiency of the organization and, for effectiveness to be accomplished, every formal detail must be seen ahead of time so that there are no individual meddling that end up disturbing the procedure.
In bureaucratic associations correspondences must be basically composed. All standards and choices must be in an archive with the goal that they can be formally legitimate. Therefore, when looked with methodology considered as bureaucratic, different sorts of reports and a few marked types of paper are gathered. On the off chance that it isn’t reported, there is no legitimacy. A bureaucratic association is basically tyrant and various leveled. There is a foundational division of work with the goal that everyone has particular parts and capacities, diverse capabilities and duties. Every individual from the procedure must know precisely what position he possesses and what work he does. Along these lines, the regulatory obligations are exceedingly specific and conveyed by the expected finishes.
- Humanistic Approach
The humanistic approach emerged in 1929, at a time when the Administrative Theory was undergoing a conceptual revolution: the transfer of the prior focus on the task (through the Scientific Administration) and organizational structure (as in Classical Theory) to the emphasis on people who work and participate in organizations.
It was this approach that made concern for the machine, the work method and the formal organization gave room for concern for people and social groups (both psychologically and sociologically). This transition occurred mainly from the 1930s in the United States, driven by changes in the social, economic and political scenario, due to the great economic depression that occurred in 1929. From then on, the main concern was to seek efficiency in organizations.
The Theory of Human Relations has developed the humanistic approach by stimulating the research in social sciences, mainly Psychology and Work Psychology, which went through two stages:
- Analysis of work and adjustment of the specialist to work
This stage is described by the dominance of the just profitable perspective, where the investigation of the human qualities that each undertaking expected of its entertainer was performed.
- The adjustment of work to the specialist
At this stage, Brain science was centered around individual and social parts of work, which prevail over profitable viewpoints (from a certain perspective). The transcendent subjects were the investigation of laborer identity and chief, inspiration and motivating forces of work and authority.
Hawthorne Experiment
It can be said that it was after Hawthorne’s experience that the School of Human Relations effectively gained prominence. The Hawthorne experience (held in the neighborhood of the same name in Chicago) was conducted by physician and sociologist Elton Mayo. It consisted of tests performed on a production line where it was found that a range of variables could positively or negatively influence employee productivity. Among these variables are the luminosity of the workplace, the group work, the quality of the work environment, etc. After the experiment was over, Mayo described it as saying that care for social aspects was favorable to entrepreneurs.
Over the time, there have been some criticisms of the School of Human Relations, such as:
– Lacking perspective of the issues of industrial relations – in a few regards the Hawthorne encounter was shaky, fake and even one-sided.
– Resistance to established hypothesis – All that it was upheld by traditional speculations was precluded by the hypothesis from securing human relations.
– Restriction in the exploratory field and favoritism in the conclusions bit by bit drove the hypothesis to some dishonor.
– Guileless and sentimental origination of the specialist.
– Overstated accentuation on casual gatherings teamed up rapidly for this hypothesis to be reexamined.
– Manipulative and demagogic approach was seen and recognized by the specialists and their associations.
Conclusion
Classical management theories are still relevant in contemporary management. Both approach, classical and human relations are complimentary. This can be seen in companies like Google and Apple, in technology industry, where, while employees are expected to accomplish their tasks within given deadline, also employer pays attentions to employee’s human needs.
REFERENCE
Business.com (2018), Management definition, retrieved from https://www.business.com/articles/human-relations-management-theory-basics/, (accessed 13th July 2018)
OxfordDictionary.com (2018), available at, https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/management, (accessed 13th July 2018)
STONER, James A. F; FREEMAN R. Edward. Administração. 5. ed. Rio de Janeiro:RJ, 1999.
Chaplim C,(no date), Modern Times, available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ieJ1_5y7fT8, (accessed 13th July 2018)
