BBA102 Principles of Management Notes
 Management – the pursuit of organizational goals efficiently and
effectively by integrating the work of people through planning,
organizing, leading and controlling the organization’s resources.
o Efficiency (the means) – using resources, people, money, raw
materials and the like wisely and cost effectively.
 Effectiveness (the ends) – achieving results to make the right decisions
and to successfully carry then out so they achieve the organization’s
goals.
 Competitive advantage – ability of an organisation to produce goods or
services more effectively than competitors do, thereby outperforming
them.
o This means organizations must stay ahead in four areas:
 Responsiveness to customers
 Innovation
 Quality
 Efficiency
Managers
 Good managers are concerned with achieving both qualities.
 Managers must draw on their experience and instincts, as well as taking
guidance from studying.
 Are task orientated, achievement orientated and people orientated.
 Good managers create value.
 What managers do:
o Planning
o Controlling
o Organizing
o Leading
 Three Levels of Management
o Top Managers – determine overall direction.
 CEOs, Presidents, Senior Vice Presidents
 Make long-term decisions about overall direction of the
organisation and establish objectives, policies and
strategies for it.
 Must be alert of environment outside of organisation,
being alert for long-run opportunities and problems, as
well as devising strategies for dealing with them.
o Middle Managers – implementing policies and plans.
 Implement the policies and plans of the top managers.
 Supervise and coordinate the activities of the first line
managers below them.
 Plant manager, district manager, regional manager.
 “High touch” jobs that can directly affect employees,
customers and suppliers.
o First-line managers
 Make short term operating decisions, directing the daily
tasks of non-managerial personnel.
 Don’t oversee the work of others.
 Required to be skilled at both supervising work and doing
it as you may be required to fill in.
 Functional Managers vs. General Managers
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o Functional Managers
 Responsible for one organizational activity.
o General Managers
 Responsible for several activities.
 CEOs can be considered general managers too. (CEOs
varied backgrounds may help to transfer expertise to an
industry)
 Three Types of Managerial Roles
Broad Managerial Roles Types of Roles
Description
Interpersonal
Managerial roles
• Show visitors
around company,
attend employee
events and present
ethical guidelines to
your subordinates.
• Responsible for
actions of
subordinates, as
their successes and
failures reflect you.
• Act like a
politician, working
with people outside
your work unit to
develop alliances.
• Constantly alert
for useful
information.
• Constantly
disseminate
important
Figurehead Role
Leadership Role
Liaison Role
Informational
Managerial roles
Monitor Role
Disseminator Role
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Decisional Managerial
roles
information to
employees.
Spokesperson Role • Best face of
activities within
organisation to
people outside of it.
Entrepreneur Role
• Initiate and
encourage
innovation.
Disturbance Handler • Fixing problems.
Role
Resource Allocator
Role
Negotiator Role
• Setting priorities
about use of
resources.
• Working with
others inside and
outside the
orginaisation to
accomplish goals.
The Multiplier Effect
 In being a manager your influence on organizations
 Why teamwork is important:
o Increased productivity
o Increased speed
o Reduced costs
o Improved quality
o Reduced destructive internal competition
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o Improved workplace cohesiveness
o People who work in groups are able to leverage their talents and
abilities to achieve more than a lone individual.
BBA102 Principles of Management - Teams
 3 dimensions of team learning:
o The capacity of a group to engage appropriately in dialogue and
discussion.
o The ability to think insightfully about complex issues and bring
together the collective intelligence of the team rather than the
insight of the dominant individual.
o The ability to provide innovative and coordinated action.
 Team – a small group of people with complementary skills who are
committed to a common purpose.
 Group – two or more freely interacting individuals who share collective
norms and goals and have a common identity.
 Various types of teams:
o Continuous improvement team
o Cross-functional team
o Problem-solving team
o Self-managed team
o Top-management team
o Virtual team
o Work team
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Five stages of group and team development
Stage
Description
Individual
Group
1. Forming
Getting orientated
and acquainted.
How do I fit
here?
Why are we
here?
2. Storming
Emergence of
What’s my role
individual
here?
personalities, roles
and conflicts.
3. Norming
Emergence of
What do the
close relationships, others expect
unity and
me to do?
harmony.
4. Performing
Solving problems
and completing
the task.
How can I best
perform in my
role?
5. Adjourning
Preparing for
disbandment.
What’s next?
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Leader
Allow time to
become
acquainted and
socialize, NOT
fight for
control.
Why are we
Encourage
fighting over
members to
who does
suggest ideas,
what and
voice
who’s in
disagreements
charge?
and work
through their
conflicts about
tasks and goals.
Can we agree Emphasize unity
on roles and
and help
work as a
identify team
team?
goals and
values.
Can we do the Allow members
job properly? the
empowerment
they need to
work on tasks
Can we help
Ease the
members
transition and
transition out? emphasize
valuable lessons
learnt.
 Roles and Norms
o Roles – a socially determined expectation of how an individual
should behave in a specific position.
o Norms – general guidelines that most group or team members
follow.
 Why norms are enforced:
 Clarify role expectations
 Help individuals avoid embarrassing situations
 Emphasize the group’s important values and
identify.
 Primacy effect
 The Nature of conflict
o Dysfunctional conflict
 Conflict that hinders the organization’s performance or
threatens its interest.
o Functional conflict
 Conflict that benefits the main purposes of the
organisation and serves its interests.
 Three kinds of conflicts
o Personality conflict (personality, attitudes and experience)
o Intergroup conflict (among groups)
o Multicultural conflict
 Building Effective Teams
o Cooperation – systematically integrate our efforts.
o Trust – reciprocal faith in each other.
o Cohesiveness – importance of togetherness.
o Performance – goals and feedback
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o Motivation – mutual accountability.
o Size – small or large teams.
o Roles – how team members are expected to behave and do.
o Norms – unwritten rules for team members
o Groupthink – peer pressure discourages thinking outside the
box.
 Why is teamwork important?
o Increased productivity
o Increased speed
o Reduced costs (efficiency)
o Improved quality
o Reduced destructive internal competition
o Improved workplace cohesiveness
BBA102 - The External Environment
• Managers and organizations are influenced by the environment as
well as interact with their environment.
• Changing environments create uncertainty.
• Environmental Uncertainty – how well managers can understand or
predict the changes and trends in the environments affecting their
organizations.
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• Stakeholders and the environment
• The Task Environment
o Customers
o Competitors
o Suppliers
o Distributors
o Strategic Allies
o Employee organizations
o Local communities
o Financial institutions
o Government regulators
o Special interest groups
o Mass media
• The General Environment
o Economic Forces
o Technological forces
o Sociocultural forces
o Demographic forces
o Political forces
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o International Forces
BBA102 – Globalization
Definition: The trend of the world economy towards becoming a more
interdependent system.
• E-commerce: the buying and selling of products and services through
computer networks.
• Global economy: increasing tendency of the economies of the world
to interact with one another as one market.
• Positive Effects: foreign firms bring expertise and links to international
markets when they invest in Australia.
• Negative effects: A race to the bottom: outsourcing of formerly wellpaying jobs overseas.
• Why companies expand internationally:
o
o
o
o
o
o
o
Availability of supplies
New markets
Lower labour costs
Financial advantage
Avoidance of tariffs and import quotas
Gaining scale
Following the customer
• Ways of expanding internationally: (low to high risk)
o Global outsourcing (lowest risk)
o Importing, exporting and countertrading
o Licensing and franchising
o Joint ventures
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o Wholly owned subsidiaries (highest risk)
• International trade and the environment
o Free trade Agreement: a trading bloc of which member
countries conduct free trade.
o Trade protectionism: Government methods in restricting trade.
BBA102 – Decision Making
• Rational Decision making (classical model):
1. Identify the problem or opportunity.
2. Think up alternative solutions
3. Evaluate alternatives and select a solution
4. Implement and evaluate the solution chosen.
o What’s wrong with the rational model?
 The rational model is prescriptive, describing how
managers should make decisions but not how managers
actually make decisions.
 Makes highly desirable assumptions that managers have
complete information, make unemotional analysis and are
able to make the best decisions for organizations.
(unrealistic)
 Constraints include: complexity, time, money and
cognitive capacity.
• Non-rational decision making:
o This model explains how managers make decisions, assuming
that decision making is nearly always uncertain and risky.
o Makes it difficult for managers to make optimal decisions.
o Three non-rational models are:
 Satisficing:
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 Managers seek alternatives to a situation until they
find one that is satisfactory, not optimal.
 Incremental
 Model in which managers take small, short-term
steps to alleviate a problem rather than steps that
will accomplish a long-term solution
 Intuition
 Making decisions based on hunches – subconscious
visceral feelings.
• Evidence-based decision making:
o The translation of principles based on best evidence onto
organizational practice, brings rationality to decision-making
process.
o Seven implementation principles:
 Treat your organisation as an unfinished prototype.
 No brag, just facts.
 See yourself and your organisation as outsiders do.
 Evidence-based management is not just for senior
executives.
 Like everything else, you still need to sell it. (dull data vs.
vivid, juicy stories and case studies).
 What happens when people fail? – forgive and remember.
• Four general decision-making styles:
1. The directive style:
a. Low tolerance for ambiguity and are orientated
towards task and technical concerns in making
decisions.
b. Focus on facts.
2. The analytical style:
a. Higher tolerance for ambiguity and are characterized by
the tendency to overanalyze a situation.
3. The conceptual-style:
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a. High tolerance for ambiguity and tend to focus on the
people or social aspects of a work situation.
b. Consider many options and future possibilities.
c. Willing to take risks and are good at finding creative
solutions to problems.
4. The behavioral style:
a. Supportive, receptive to suggestions, show warmth and
prefer verbal to written information.
b. People with this style wor the best with others.
• Group and team decision making:
o Advantages or group decision making
 Greater pool of knowledge
 Different perspectives
 Intellectual stimulation
 Better understanding of decision rationale.
 Deeper commitment to the decision.
o Disadvantages of group decision making:
 A few people dominate and intimidate.
 Groupthink (occurs when group members thrive to agree
for the sake of unanimity and thus avoid accurately
assessing the decision situation).
 Satisficing
 Goal displacement
o What managers need to know about group decision making:
 Less efficient
 Size affects decision quality
 They may be too confident
 Knowledge counts
o Participative management:
 Process of involving employees in setting goals, making
decisions, solving problems and making changes in the
organisation.
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o Group Solving techniques:
 Consensus
 Brainstorming
 Delphi technique – group process that physically dispersed
experts who fill out questionnaires to anonymously
generate ideas.
 Computer-aided decision making (predetermined
questions answered on electronic keypads or dials)
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BBA102 – Culture
• National Culture – shared set of beliefs, values, knowledge and patterns of
behavior common to a group of people.
• Cultural Dimensions
 Low-context culture
i. Shared meanings are primarily
derived from written and
spoken words.
 High-context culture
i. People rely heavily on
situational cues for meaning
when communicating with
others.
• Globe Project’s 9 Cultural Dimensions
1. Power Distance
2. Uncertainty avoidance
3. Institutional collectivism
4. In-group collectivism
5. Gender egalitarianism
6. Assertiveness
7. Future orientation
8. Performance orientation
9. Human orientation
• Other cultural variations
1. Language
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2. Interpersonal space
3. Communication
4. Time orientation
a. Monochromic
b. Polychromic
5. Religion
• Organizational or ‘corporate’ culture – system of shared beliefs and
values develops within an organization and guides the behavior of its
members.
• Three Levels of Organizational Culture
1. Observable artefacts
a. Physical manifestations such as manner of dress, awards, myths
and stories about the company.
b. Visible behavior exhibited by managers and employees.
2. Espoused Values
a. Espoused values – explicitly stated values and norms preferred
by an organization.
b. Enacted values – represented the values and norms actually
exhibited in the organization.
3. Basic Assumptions
a. Represent the core values of the organizations culture.
b. Those taken for granted and highly resistant to change.
• How employees learn culture
o Symbol – an object, act, quality, or event that conveys meaning
to others.
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o Story – narrative based on true events, which is repeated and
sometimes embellished upon to emphasize a particular value.
o Hero – person whose accomplishments embody the values of
the organization.
o Rites and Rituals – activities and ceremonies, planned and
unplanned, that celebrate important occasions and
accomplishments in the organization’s life.
• Functions of organizational culture
o Organizational identity
o Sense-making device
o Collective commitment
o Social system stability.
• Process of culture change
1. Formal Statements
2. Slogans and sayings
3. Stories, legends and myths
4. Leader reactions to crises
5. Role modelling, training and coaching
6. Physical design
7. Rewards, titles, promotions and bonuses
8. Organizational goals and performance criteria
9. Measurable and controllable activities
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10.
Organizational structure
11.
Organizational systems and procedures
BBA102 – Ethics & Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR)
• Ethics – standards of right and wrong that influence behavior.
• Ethical issues in business categorized in five dimensions:
o Political issues
o Employment issues
o Governance issues
o Environmental issues
o Consumer issues
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