Management Theory, Innovation, and Organisation

A Model of Managerial Competencies

Katarzyna Szczepańska-Woszczyna

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2020
• ISBN:
  9781000293784
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Negocios y empresa
• Subtopic: Desarrollo organizacional

Competencies are a component of human capital and one of the most important assets of an enterprise. They play an important role in strengthening the position of the company in a competitive market. Investing in the development of competencies increases the organisation's ability to grow and compete through innovations. This book presents a multi-dimensional analysis of the relationship between managerial competencies and innovations. It analyses the role of a manager in a modern organisation, functions performed by managers, management styles and key challenges, including shaping behaviour in the process of managing change in an organisation, as well as an analysis of the structure of competencies, in particular managerial competencies, and the conditions of the process of forming managerial competencies.

Management Theory, Innovation and Organisation: A Model of Managerial Competencies illustrates the organisational conditions of innovativeness, which is the relationship between strategy, structure, organisational culture and leadership and knowledge management and innovation management. The developed model can undoubtedly be considered the author's pioneering contribution to the studies of managerial competencies and innovativeness.

The book will be valuable to researchers, students, and managers in the fields of leadership, organizational studies, innovation management, and human resource management.

1The Manager in a Traditional and Modern Organisation

1.1 Manager, Entrepreneur, Entrepreneurship – In the Theory of Management and Economics

Referring to management-related sources created on the basis of research conducted over the last half a century as well as the experience of many companies, one can find the following phrases related to the term “manager”: acting as a representative of the organisation, monitoring and transmitting information, creating networks and relations, negotiating, planning work, directing and monitoring the work of their subordinates, managing human resources, solving problems, initiating innovation (Hales, 2001, 5). It is hard to disagree with the statement that the development and operation of an organisation in its life cycle is a consequence of actions and decisions (or lack thereof) of its managers. A small group of people at the top of an enterprise’s organisational structure may change its fate immeasurably and influence its results. They take both strategic and operational decisions, set both long-term and short-term goals, solve large and small organisational problems, employ people, and prod and inspire employees. They represent their organisations in external relations. So who is a manager?

Various management concepts – from Frederick Winslow Taylor to Charles Barnard, to representatives of the Human Relations School, to contemporary concepts of New Public Management or the Strategic Performance Management System – have defined managerial functions, emphasised ever new aspects of an organisation, and equipped managers with knowledge and tools for the effective implementation of the goals imposed on them (Górski, 2009). The term “manager” is related to the emergence of so-called managerial capitalism, in which there have been processes of creating companies of anonymous capital and, therefore, separating the ownership functions from the management functions in an enterprise (Pierścieniak, 2006).

Managers are persons empowered by the owners of an enterprise to manage its activities on an ongoing basis. The diversity and specific nature of enterprise management processes make the term “manager” a rather broad and capacious category. Two approaches prevail in the sources in this regard:

•the broad approach, in which each person who manages an organisation or a separate part of it is considered a manager, regardless of their position occupied in the organisational hierarchy; these are people who manage the work of others and are superiors of others, and who are expected to take decisions which have a significant impact on the achievements and results of the entire organisation, as well as taking responsibility for these results; from this perspective, managers are people at the highest level, but also at the middle and lower levels, of management in the individual functional areas of the organisation;

•the narrower approach, in which the concept of a manager is only applied to a specific group of managers, generally at the highest and middle management level (executives) (Drucker, 2006b; Chandler, 1978).

From the point of view of strategic decisions, managers are people whose responsibility covers the level of the entire organisation. They take decisions individually, and constitute groups (top management teams) or other managerial bodies (e.g. boards of directors) (Finkelstein, Hambrick, & Cannella, 2009, 4). According to Pocztowski (2007), the basic distinguishing features of managers’ work are specific functions and contributions to the organisation, as well as such features as high competences and strong motivation, which allow them to integrate material, financial and human resources around the implementation of business processes. The basic distinguishing feature of a manager is their substantive authority, the sources of which are knowledge and motivation. This distinguishes him or her from lower-level managerial positions, which focus on planning and administration, while a manager focuses on motivating and the ability to lead the organisation through a transformation which is necessary to survive in a turbulent environment (Koźmiński, Jemielniak, & Latusek-Jurczak, 2014).

Over the last 20 years, apart from the interest in various conditions of managers’ work (Becherer & Maurer, 1999; Drucker, 2006a; Kets de Vries, 1995; Zaleznik, 1990), the growing interest of scientists in the activities of entrepreneurs can be observed (Frese, Chell, & Klandt, 2000; Kets de Vries, 1996). Managers and entrepreneurs are characterised as setting and implementing patterns in an organisation – with managers seen as establishing order through co-ordination of the flow of resources and people’s work through teamwork, whereas entrepreneurs are perceived as “creating a new world” (Czarniawska-Joerges & Wolff, 1991). An entrepreneur is a person running a profit-oriented business and bearing the risk and full responsibility for achieving specific results. In a broader etymological sense, an entrepreneur is an individual who “takes something on” – being active, brisk, vigorous, taking the initiative, and exhibiting increased activity and initiative outside an enterprise.

The term “entrepreneur” appeared in the works of Jean B. Say and Joseph A. Schumpeter. Say defined an entrepreneur as a person who creates or controls an enterprise, perceives and takes advantage of favourable business opportunities, and is the driving force behind economic change and progress (Bratnicki & Strużyna, 2001, 36). Say perceived entrepreneurship as a change in the benefits achieved by the entrepreneur through the use of ever-new factors of production. An entrepreneur becomes active for fear of loss or for expectation of benefit (Say, 1960, 550–555).

According to Schumpeter, the direct impulse for an activity “based on combining the factors of production” is a desire to create and to break out of routine (Schumpeter, 1961). He saw the entrepreneur as a predestined individual capable of innovation (the entrepreneur as “a creative innovator”). Schumpeter considered the entrepreneur to have creative and heroic leadership skills (Brouwer, 2002, 83–105). The desire and energy to act, dynamism and constructiveness, and the ability to act against established views and rules existing so far. Introducing new ideas required the entrepreneur to have appropriate skills and the courage to take great risks. The entrepreneur was characterised by the willingness to act, the ability to make others subordinate as well as managerial and leadership skills (Schumpeter, 2002).

The entrepreneur is an innovator, co-ordinator and manager – an individual with a distinctive ability to receive signals from the market and use resources to build balance in the organisation. Many authors see an important feature of the entrepreneur as the ability to see and take advantage of a market opportunity – even “to chase a market opportunity”. In Drucker’s understanding, “an entrepreneur is always looking for change, responding to it and using it as an opportunity”, while entrepreneurship is more of a way of doing things than a personality trait (Drucker, 2011).

The definitions of an entrepreneur and entrepreneurship can be divided into three basic categories (Bratnicki, 2005; Bratnicki & Strużyna, 2001):

•functional approach to entrepreneurship, relating to the economic functions of entrepreneurship in the economy; in this sense, an entrepreneur is an individual engaged in economic activity who seeks profitable opportunities and organises and manages undertakings of a productive nature, making conclusive decisions on the co-ordination of available resources and bearing the risk of failure;

•personal characteristics of an entrepreneur, relating to his or her personal traits and social functions; an entrepreneurial individual exhibits creative characteristics (ingenuity, creativity, perceptiveness) as well as practical characteristics (diligence, managerial and organisational skills);

•entrepreneurship as a specific management style, a type of managerial behaviour (approach).

Entrepreneurship also appears in the sources as a feature of an organisation. According to Drucker, “an entrepreneurial enterprise” treats entrepreneurship as a duty based on making the organisation receptive to innovations, and each innovation is considered an opportunity, not a threat (Drucker, 1985). An entrepreneurial organisation can see opportunities in its environment, supports the creation of new ideas, and can implement them in practice. Related to this approach is the concept of intra-entrepreneurship, understood as promoting and developing entrepreneurship within an organisation (De Jong & Wennekers, 2008; Parker, 2011). Entrepreneurship is considered to be one of the most important contemporary means of gaining and maintaining a competitive advantage. Entrepreneurship is an important source of the development of innovation. Creative and entrepreneurial actions intermingle, generating a broader phenomenon – innovation.

Therefore, entrepreneurship must become a feature, a managerial competence – if the organisation they manage is to be innovative and competitive. Managers with entrepreneurial competence support the creation of new ventures, as well as the survival and development of the enterprise (Bird, 2002; Boyatzis, 1982). The catalogue of entrepreneurial competences lists vision and the ability to perceive opportunities and possibilities, the ability to observe and analyse the main market players and competitors, the ability to work independently and adopt a proactive approach aimed at achieving objectives (including those considered unattainable by others), the ability to optimise processes, motivation, activity and effectiveness. It is a combination of skills, imagination, good planning and common sense, the ability to take decisions independently and take risks, the desire for rapid development, innovative nature, the ability to think strategically and learn from mistakes, and the ability to negotiate and mediate, as well as having leadership qualities (Baum & Locke, 2004; Brinckmann, 2006; Brophy & Kiely, 2002; Šebestová, 2020).

The role and function of managers in the organisation have changed, and so have management schools. Various management concepts, starting from Frederick W. Taylor, defined managerial functions, referred to ever more different aspects of the organisation, and emphasised tools for the effective performance of tasks by managers. F. W. Taylor (1856–1915) proposed the concept of functional management, called Taylor’s functional system, which was treated as the opposite of the traditional model of business management by the manager-owner, where employees are subordinated to him or her in a linear manner (Martyniak, 1989, 16–22). Research conducted by Chester Barnard (1886–1961) concerned, among others, relationships between managers and employees, with particular emphasis on the importance of authority. He also drew attention to the ethical and social obligations of managers towards society (Lachiewicz & Matejun, 2012, 102). The representatives of the Human Relations school, such as E. Mayo, D. McGregor and M. P. Follett, conducted research on motivation, which became the basis for research on the importance of managers motivating and stimulating employees to work. As part of this trend, theory X and theory Y were developed. The effect of the research conducted by the authors of interpersonal relations was the establishment of numerous principles pertaining to methods of team management (Lachiewicz & Matejun, 2012, 104–106). The concept of New Public Management introduces a managerial approach to public sector management, the adaptation of management methods and techniques used in the private sector to the conditions of public organisation management, in particular the focus of these organisations on achieving results, management decentralisation, adopting a strategic perspective and using market mechanisms. The concept of the Strategic Performance Management System assumed a change in the emphasis of managers from managing tasks of which processes consist to managing the performance achieved as a result of the implementation of these processes and projects. Individual concepts and schools represented different ideas about the organisation itself and the tasks that managers face. Nevertheless, they agreed that a fundamental criterion for assessing the work of managers is the effectiveness of task performance and contributing to the organisation’s success in a competitive market (Zalewski, 2005, 66; Górski, 2009, 43).

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Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Series Information
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• List of Figures
• List of Tables
• Introduction
• 1 The Manager in a Traditional and Modern Organisation
• 2 Managerial Competencies as a Subject of Research
• 3 Innovation and Innovativeness. Determinants of the Innovativeness of an Organisation:
• 4 Managerial Competencies and Their Impact on the Innovativeness of an Enterprise
• Conclusion
• Index