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It is difficult to decide which values a manager should pay more attention to. According to Stephen Robbins’s in “The Essentials of Organizational Behavior” trust is defined as a “positive expectation that another will not – through words, actions or decision -- act opportunistically”.[42] He goes on to present that trust is multi-dimensional and therefore encompasses a vast range of values within it. The Five Dimensions of trust that he mentions are as follows:
Integrity: honesty and truthfulness
Competence: Technical and interpersonal knowledge and skills
Consistency: Reliability, predictability, and good judgement
Loyalty; Willingness to protect and save face for a person
Openness: Willingness to share ideas and information freely[43]
By developing each of these qualities, a manager will encourage a trustworthy environment in his relationships with his employees as well as his superiors.
As Robbins suggests, trust is something that we expect as the outcome from a person through our experiences with them. Over time, we get a sense of how that person behaves and acts accordingly to our behavior. Trust is a rather sensitive issue to most people and requires that managers act appropriately to gain the trust needed to lead effectively. It is dangerous to lose trust of an employee as they may not respect your judgment without it.
Managers who want to engage in trustworthy relationships with their workers, according to Robbins’s guidelines, must follow certain practices that show integrity, competence and consistency.[44] Without these three characteristics, all aspect of trust becomes meaningless. The normal day to day actions of a manager affect the level of trust that each employee will have in him/her.
Managers of different levels and cultures prioritize trust differently. This is evident when evaluating how managerial decisions can build trust through the Managerial Linkage System. In “Managerial Leadership at Twelve O’Clock” Charles Kerns, describes that on one end of the managerial scale is an untrustworthy manager who accomplishes his goals with lies and deception to obtain the numbers. On the other end of the scale is a manager who uses the trust of his workers to accomplish the same numbers. It is clear that the untrusting manager is taking a shortcut through the managerial system from 12-9 and the trusting manager has taken the time and effort to move along from 12-3-6-9 as shown in the figure below.[45]
The untrusting manager’s shortcut disregards the concerns of the workers and in turn ignores the quality of output to the customers. This will effect worker retention times and create poor customer satisfaction. Though this manager may achieve sales targets the first time around it will not last. The second time through the cycle the results will begin to drop off due to poor management and a lack of trust. Conversely, the trusting manager gains the trust of the workers and forms a great relationship with them. Worker retention is much longer and they tend to do a much better job caring for the customers. With happier customers will come the increased sales. The second time around the cycle, the trustworthy manager will have an easier time achieving the same or improved sales. The Managerial Linkage System demonstrates that having employee trust will cause business performance to increase.
Can we learn how to become an effective manager?
Last decades, many visions thought that we could learn how to become an effective manager. We could refer to the success of many institutions where MBA programs are offered. Many young high intelligent business men are taught how to become successful. Nevertheless the success of these business schools, there is a lack of correlation between scholastic standing and the success in business. Clearly, what a student learns about management in graduate school, does not equip him to build a successful career in business.
For Livingstone S. (1971) the reason for this failure could be found in the fact that[46]:”they don’t learn from their formal education what they need to know to perform their job effectively. The tasks that are the most important in getting results usually are left to be learned on the job, where few managers ever master them simply because no one teaches them how.”
Реферат опубликован: 16/05/2006