Human Resource Management Practice paper
时间:2011-04-15 09:26:02 来源:www.ukthesis.org 作者:英国论文网 点击:338次
1.0 Introduction Managerial prerogative refers to that managers make rules and put these rules into practice, for example, managers or business owners suppress or encourage conflict through management measures and such behavior is managerial prerogative. When different people consider a specific issue, the initiative of that they accept the constraints of management authority is different. For example, some managers are willing to discuss with the employees about their pay structure , job design and work practices and other issues related, however, maybe he will be reluctant to or even not discuss business investment, product pricing policies and development of products and other related issues. In whatever case, even if the managers are willing to consult with their employees, and get involved in the affairs or even hold talks together, still, they will insist their privilege to make the final decision. Thus, in specific areas of employee relations, such as the promotion and training of the employees, managerial prerogative exists naturally (Bray and Waring, 2006). However, is it possible for managers to exercise their managerial prerogative without interference from the other actors in the employment relationship? Absolutely no. Now, managers prefer to solving problems through the use of their good negotiating ability rather than the abuse of managerial prerogative, and the fundamental changes in the processes and structure of corporation management has resulted in that decentralization management has been adopted by more and more enterprises. At the same time, other factors in employment relationship, like trade union and government also play an important role in business decisions and business affairs. This essay analyses the pros and cons of centralization and decentralization, two different kinds of corporate management models, and reveals the necessary for business owners and managers to integrate centralization with decentralization from the perspective of benefits through analysis of several cases. At the same time this essay discusses the importance of states and trade union for enterprises.
2.0 Analysis of advantages and disadvantages of centralization of power and managerial prerogative for business and analysis of concrete cases related Followings are analysis of managerial prerogative and centralization of power from the perspective of economic costs enterprises. The main economic costs for enterprise management consist of information costs and agent costs. Information costs mean that in a system of centralization, senior managers can not grasp the information of the business environment in time and completely, while the junior staff has access to the accurate information, however, they do no have authorities to make any decision, thus companies can not make effective and rational decision, resulting in the cost of information asymmetry (Gomez-Mejia et al 2008). The agent cost refers to that in the system of decentralization, the agent relationship among various levels of managers and staff of the enterprises will produce costs. The greater degree of decentralization of power is in, the higher this kind of cost will be. Excessive centralization of power will increase information cost while excessive decentralization will enhance the agent costs. In the management system of modern enterprise, the board of directors and senior managers are often awarded power to make all decision, include the property right. And all decision-making power is then delegated to every stage in accordance with the rules established by the authority, to individuals and organization. This will definitely make the agent chain extend so that the fiduciary responsibilities will be diverse and the business decisions will be closer to the grassroots level, which will greatly reduce the cost caused by information asymmetry, however, the agent costs due to conflicts of interest among the agents will be higher, and this approach will eventually be detrimental to business progress. In order to overcome various deficiencies of both centralization and decentralization, it is necessary for enterprise to integrate both two kinds of manage system and transfer part of power to lower levels. In general, the power of making decisions concerning the overall situation of the development enterprises, such as business policy decisions, investment plans, financial budget ,or identification of business development strategy, should be assigned to senior managers of business owners; as to the routine decision-making power like the establishment of specific project planning, control of cash flow, management reporting and relevant analysis, and the implementation of financial budget, enterprises should let the staff in and allocate the power to middle managers; and for the average cost control, choice of procurement method and other daily activities, its power can be directly transferred to grassroots employees (Stone, 2005). Followings are two cased to prove the necessity of the integration of centralization and decentralization. First, take Lenovo Group as an example. In a long term, all of the funds are managed by lenovo headquarters, and the result of centralization is that the headquarters are well aware of the synergy stage and the direction of utilization of all funds, which has made Lenovo profit a lot in the early stages of development. However, when its total assets reached four million RMB and the capital requirements of any deal may be as much as tens of millions, since the lower staff lack adequate funding, and they have to report and apply level by level, apparently this situation will affect the progress the business (Lee, 1996). Thus, the possibility that managers or business owners make business decisions without interference from other factors in employment relationship like lower staff or the existing environment will limit the development of enterprises.#p#分页标题#e# While GE Company, a large multinational company who has integrated centralization with decentralization successfully, is no doubt a successful example for other global companies due to its operation strategy and management style. GE company has adopted a flexible "global center system" that has integrated centralization with decentralization. On one hand, the parent company has a tight control in the three key areas, including financial, personnel and research and development; on the other hand, the parent company has endowed great autonomy to the subsidiaries in areas like marketing decision, labour relationship, relation of production. This management style has saved resources and improved efficiency in cooperation and has fully mobilized the enthusiasm of staff at all levels and increased operational flexibility through a decentralized management of the subsidiary companies, so that GE Company can get good value. It has been most widely used in multinational enterprises to integrate centralized system with the decentralization system, which is also one of GM's secrets to have achieved success. In the actual management, we should have a clear definition that what right the business owner should insist and centralize, and what right they should descend and decentralize according to the actual situation, and put it into practice (Wood et al 2004). Otherwise, it is hard to get benefits and furthermore to cause greater confusion.
3.0 The role that states play in business decision and development of enterprise
4.0 Conclusion
References Bray, M. and Waring, P. (2006) The Rise of Managerial Prerogative under the Howard Government, Australian Bulletin of Labour, vol.32, no.1, pp.45-62 Elwood, F. Holton and James, W. Trott, Jr. (1996) Trends Toward a Closer Integration of Vocational Education and Human Resources Development, Journal of Vocational and Technical Education, Vol. 12, No. 2, p7 Lee, E. (1996) "Globalization and employment", International Labour Review, Vol. 135 No.5, pp. 85–98. Gomez-Mejia, Luis, R., David, B. Balkin and Robert, L. Cardy (2008). Management: People, Performance, Change, 3rd edition. New York, New York USA: McGraw-Hill. ISBN 978-0-07-302743-2. pp. 23-40 Perline, M. and Poynter, D. (1990), Union and Management Perceptions of Managerial Prerogatives: Some Insight into the Future of Co-operative Bargaining in the USA, British Journal of Industrial Relations, vol. 28, no.2, p179-197 Stone, R. (2005) Human Resource Management, 5th edition, John Wiley and Sons, QLD Australia.pp 392-405
Wood , J., Wallace, J., Zeffane, R.C., Hampan, J., Fromholtz,M., Morrison,V ( 2004) Organisational Behaviour:A global perspective, 3rd edition, John Wiley and Sons, QLD, Australia.pp 344-360 |