Managerial skills

A Manager needs a number of specific skills if they are to succeed.These skills include:

♤ Technical skills

♤ Interpersonal skills

♤ Conceptual skills

♤ Diagnostic and analytic skills

a). Technical skills

These are skills necessary to accomplish or understand the specific kind of work being done in an organization. Such skills include engineering, medical, accounting, marketing etc.

It’s very important for the line managers because they train subordinates and answer questions about work related problems. They must know how to perform the tasks and good to supervise if they are to be effective managers.

b). Interpersonal skills

Managers spend considerable time interacting with people both inside and outside the organization. Managers need interpersonal skills, the ability to communicate with understanding and motivate individuals and groups. As the manager climbs the ladder, they must be able to get along with subordinates, peers, and those at higher levels of the organization.

They must be also be able to work with customers, suppliers, investors, and others outside the organization. A manager with good interpersonal skills is likely to be more successful.

c). Conceptual skills

Depends on the manager’s ability to think on the abstract.

Managers need the mental capacity to understand the overall workings of the organization and its environment, to grasp how all the parts of the organization fit together and to view the organization in holistic manner. This shows them to think strategically, to see the big picture, and to make broad-based decisions that serve the overall organization.

d). Diagnostic and Analytic skills

Enables the manager to visualize the most appropriate response to a situation.

A manager needs to diagnose and analyze a problem in the organization by studying its symptoms and then developing a solution. This can be done in all departments such as personnel and sales.

Personnel Policies

A policy is a plan of action, and a “plan” within an organization is policy. Policy making and planning are therefore synonymous.

A policy (Flippo 1976) says is a man- made rule of pre –determined course of action that is established to guide the performance of work towards the organization objectives. It is a kind of standing plan that serves to guide subordinates in the execution of their tasks.

Calhoon (1967) says personnel policies constitute guides to action. They furnish the general standards or bases in which decisions are reached. Policies are statements of the organizations over-all proposes its objectives in the various areas with which its operations are concerned:- personnel, finance, production, marketing, etc.

Thus personnel policies refers to principles and rules of conduct which formulate, redefine, break into details, and decide a number of actions that govern the relationship with employees in the attainment of the organization objective

NOTE: Personnel policies are;

i. The keystone in the arch of management and the life-blood for the successful functioning of the personnel. Management without these policies cannot be any lasting improvements in labor management relations.

ii. The statement of intention indicating an agreement to a general course of action, indicating specifically what the organization proposes to do and thus suggest the values and new points which dominate the organizations actions.

iii. A positive declaration and a command to an organization. They translate the goals of an organization into selected routes and provide general guidelines that prescribes and proscribe programs which in turn dictate practices and procedures

Aims and objectives of personnel policies

There are two types of management personnel policy objective: - general and specific

A. General objectives –They should express top management basic philosophy of human resources and reflect its deep underlying convictions as to the importance of people in an organization and of the management activity which deals with people i.e. personnel administration.

B. Specific objectives –They should refer to the various activities of personnel administration connected with staffing, training, developing wage and salary administration, motivation, employee services and benefits, employee records, labor relations and personnel research.

The aims of personnel policies should be/are;

I. To enable an organization to fulfill or carry out the main objectives which have been laid down as the desirable minima of general employment policy.

II. To ensure that its employees are informed of these items of policy and to secure their co-operation.

III. To provide such conditions of employment and procedures as will enable all the employees to develop sincere sense of unity with the enterprise and to carry out their duties in the most willing and effective manner.

IV. To provide an adequate competent and trained personnel for all levels and types of management.

V. To protect the common interests of all the parties and recognize the role of trade unions in the organization.

VI. To provide for a consultative participation by employees in the management of an organization and the framing of conditions for this participation which however shall not take place in the technical, financial, or trading policy

VII. To provide an efficient consultative service which aims at creating mutual faith among those who work in the enterprise. This is:-

a. By developing management leadership which is bold and imaginative and guided by moral values.

b. By effectively delegating the human relations aspects of personnel functions to line managers.

c. By enforcing discipline on the basis of co-operative understanding and a humane application of rules and regulations.

d. By providing for a happy relationship at all levels.

VIII. To establish the conditions from mutual confidence and avoid confusion and misunderstanding between the Management and workers by developing suggestion, plan joint management councils, work committees, and by performance appraisal discussions.

IX. To provide security of employment to workers so that they may not be distracted by uncertainty of their future.

X. To provide an opportunity for growth within the organization to persons who are willing to learn and undergo training to improve their future prospects.

XI. To provide for payment of fair and adequate wages and salary to workers so that their healthy co-operation maybe ensured for an efficient working of the undertaking.

XII. To recognize the work and accomplishments of the employees by offering non- monetary incentives.

XIII. To create a sense of responsibility on the part of those in authority for the claims of employees as human beings, who should be guaranteed protection of their fundamental rights and offered enough scope for developing their potential.

In Summary personnel policies should respect human dignity and personnel integrity, ensure fair treatment for all, irrespective of caste, creed, or color and offer reasonable sound and economic security to employees.

They should be designed as to ensure that work and accomplishment are properly recognized, that safe and healthy conditions of work are created, that common interests are promoted and employee participation is encouraged, that the role of trade unions is recognized and their functions and responsibilities are respected, and that the employees satisfaction and motivation and their development as individuals are properly looked after.