Self Reflection On Mintzberg Managerial Roles

Literature Review

Discuss About The Self Reflection On Mintzberg Managerial Roles.

Organizations exist to achieve specific goals and to attain their objectives all the departments and functions need to operate optimally. Managers perform various roles in an organisation ranging from ensuring the proper running of all departments to liaising with the organisation’s stakeholders. Managers, therefore, are at the heart of any success or failure in organisations as their actions or inactions will determine whether or not an organisation takes full advantages of the available opportunities and deals successfully with threats to its existence.  Mintzberg analysed the various functions that managers undertake in their day to day work and classified them into three broad categories: Interpersonal, informational and decisional roles. Each of these managerial roles encompasses specific behaviours and activities that a manager undertakes in the course of his or her daily work. The reflection will focus on Mintzberg’s interpersonal managerial role which consists of Liaison, Figurehead and leadership functions.

The precursors to Mintzberg’s study of management functions and roles were illustrious management gurus including Tom Peters, Michael Porter, Henry Fanyol and Warren Bennis (Mintzberg, 2009). Fanyol was concerned with the control function of management and came up with the fourteen principles of management which later formed the bedrock of the management science.  (Narayanan & Nath, 1993). On his part, Peters focuses on management efficiency and more specifically on action based management (Peters & Waterman, 1982). All these professionals laid the ground for the Revolutionary work of Henry Mintzberg on Managerial roles.  

Dr Henry Mintzberg, a Canadian management professional, evaluated the various levels and categorisations of managers and concluded that all managers performed similar essential functions irrespective of their hierarchical positions in the organisation. He came up with ten roles or “organised sets of behaviours” that are common to all managers which he later categorised into three principal managerial roles: interpersonal, Decisional and informational roles (Mintzberg, 1973).  The interpersonal role encompasses leadership, liaison and figurehead functions while informational role deals with the work of the manager as a disseminator of information, the organisation or department’s spokesperson and the monitor of the various aspects of the organisation or department. As a decision maker, the manager has to wear the hat of the entrepreneur, resource allocator disturbance handler and negotiator. All managers, irrespective of whether they are in top management or the lower level management perform all these roles.

Self-Analysis/Reflection of the Interpersonal Managerial Role

The interpersonal role is one of the essential functions that any manager performs in the course of his or her work in an organisation. The interpersonal roles include acting as the department or organisation’s leader, liaison officer and figurehead. As the leader, the manager ensures that the employees in the department or the whole organisation perform at their best through proper motivation and provision of a good working environment.  The manager provides effective communication channels for networking both within the and outside the organisation, which ensures that the organisation or department keeps abreast of the current event that may have a bearing on the operation of the organisation. Also, being a liaison person means that the manager is charged with the responsibility of keeping in touch with the stakeholders and appraising them accordingly.  As the topmost person in a department or organisation, it is the manager’s duty to represents the other employees in various social and legal functions acting as the symbol of authority and status.     

Many managers consider the interpersonal managerial role as the most significant in their job irrespective of whether the manager in question operates in the higher echelons of the organisation or is just a low-level manager. Among the ten managerial roles recognised by Mintzberg, managers consider components of the interpersonal roles as most applicable in their positions. “Leadership” features prominently as one of the roles that rank highest among management professionals, probably because leadership role allows a manager the weld together different elements into a comprehensive whole (Mintzberg, 2009). In another study on private and public managers, the researchers Pavett and Lau found out that the ‘leader’ role was the most used by managers regardless of the work setting (Pavett & Lau, 1983). Also, the researchers found out that the ‘leader’ role was not career-specific and could be used by managers across the industries.  Pavett and Lau’s study indicates that hierarchy has a bearing on the ranking of managerial roles, with low-level managers ranking leader role highest while high-level managers consider other managerial roles including disseminator, negotiator, liaison, spokesperson and figurehead as important in their daily activities at the workplace.  Another study by Muma, Smith, & Somers (2006) collaborates with earlier findings on the importance of the ‘leader’ role to managers. The study set out to apply Mintzberg’s managerial roles model in the evaluating management in academic departments, and the results indicated that PA department Chairpersons and Faculty ranked the leader construct as the one that is important in the management of the department. In the Study, the Decision and informational roles were less important in the managers’ lives especially novice managers. However, more experienced PA departments chairpersons tended to use the liaison and figurehead roles much more frequently (Davies, 2006).   

Mintzberg’s managerial roles model, like all management models, applies to manager’s life as well as to the normal life. In its essence, management is all about leading an organised life harnessing the resources at one’s disposal effectively to achieve set life goals (Chodorek, 2010). In other words, management positions at the workplace is an extension of one’s personal life and a chaotic life can herald a difficult life as a manager.

Going through this course, I have come to appreciate the similarity of managing my personal life and running a department or an organisation. In both cases, there are limited resources and infinite wants, and it is up to the person to rationalise on the best use of the resources at hand to meet the stated objectives and goals.

A challenging management task that I can recall was a class group assignment in which I was made the group leader. For starters, I was not the best student in the subject, and I had a feeling that the group settled on me as the leader as they wanted to avoid responsibility. My inferiority coloured the first few minutes of our discussions, and I would feel slighted any time a member of the group challenged or corrected any of my suggestions. Consequently, the first meeting ended up in disarray and when the professor demanded feedback on the project’s progress, I had a difficult time explaining that little was achieved in that first sitting. In subsequent meetings, I decided to play the role of the leader in leveraging the diverse skills of the members to archive the group’s objectives. My role changed from the one of a lord to a facilitator, negotiating egos and getting the best out of the group members. Throughout the life of the group project, my roles tended to draw on many of Mintzberg’s interpersonal and informational and decisional roles. As head of the group, I had to play the figurehead role and attend any group leaders’ meetings. I was the liaison person between the group and the lecturer and in addition to negotiating with the professor if the group needed something from him such as extended deadlines. In the course of the project, I played the role of resource allocator deciding on the time allocated to the members’ contributions during debates and moderating the debate to prevent it degenerating into a shouting match.   At the end of the project, I was expected to present the report and allocate group members parts of the report on which they would answer questions from the other students. The class group project was a success as we ended up being the second-best group in the class. The professor was surprised that we ended the project on such as high note as he had almost given up on our group during the initial stages of the project which was characterised by inefficiencies and lack of focus.

After taking the three management diagnostic tests, I have realised that I have strengths and weaknesses in the various parts of my managerial life. One of the strengths that I have noted is that I learn and adapt fairly fast to issues. Secondly, I have realised that I have a knack for effectively managing a team by giving all the members chances to contribute their input on any issue that needs deliberation. Also, I excel in Problem-solving and decision-making areas. These are areas that need strengthening through continuous learning and keeping up to date with current best practices in the field.   

I have notable weaknesses in various areas including Coaching and developing my team, and leading change. These weaknesses need a comprehensive plan both in learning and practice. There is a need to increase and update my knowledge on the recognised weaknesses and also find opportunities in real life in which I can act out the information learned.  

Personal Development Plan

Name:

Date:

Part 1: Personal Analysis

Part 2: Setting Goals

Conclusion

Mintzberg’s managerial roles is a revolutionary way of understanding the functions of a manager. All managers irrespective of their hierarchy in the organisation employ the ten roles in their daily management activities. However, upper management tends to use the decisional and informational roles more compared to low-level managers. At the same time, upper-level managers play the role of a figurehead in many instances compared to the managers at the bottom of the ladder.   

References

Chodorek, M. (January 01, 2010). Self-assesment of the Positive Potential of Organisation by managers of Polish companies: Research results. Journal of Positive Management, 1, 85-96.

Davies, M. F., & Kanaki, E. (October 01, 2006). Interpersonal characteristics associated with different team roles in work groups. Journal of Managerial Psychology, 21, 7, 638-650.

Mintzberg, H. (1973). The Nature of Managerial Work, Harpercollins College Division.

Mintzberg, H. (2009a). The evolution of a model of managing. Retrieved from https://www.mintzberg.org/sites/default/files/managingmodel.pdf  

Mintzberg, H. (2009b) The evolution of a model of managing. Retrieved from https://www.mintzberg.org/sites/default/files/managingmodel.pdf

Muma, R. D., Smith, B., & Somers, P. A. (January 01, 2006). Use of Mintzberg’s Model of Managerial Roles to Evaluate Academic Administrators. Journal of Allied Health, 35, 2, 65-74.

Narayanan, V. K., & Nath, R. (1993). Organization theory: a strategic approach, Irwin.

Pavett C.M. & Lau A.W. (1983). Managerial work: the influence of hierarchical level and functional specialty. Acad Manage J; 26:170–177.

Peters, T. J., & Waterman, R. H. (1982). In search of excellence: Lessons from America’s best-run companies. New York: Harper & Row. 

Porter, M. (2008). The five competitive forces that shape strategy. Harvard Business Review, 82–83.

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