Management Theory

Management theory is one of the most important parts of organizational management. Based on the objective and the type of the organization, manager can set up a plan and apply different management theory to help the whole organization achieve its objective. As we know, classical theory is really important in management area, it is not only influence the area in the past, also now. But, what is classical theory? Generally, there are three theory were classified as classical theory, which are Frederick Winslow Taylor, Henri Fayol and Lyndall Urwick.

Frederick Winslow Taylor was the first person who mentioned scientific management in the past. It is a management theory base on scientific method and standardization. This theory pursues to find out the best way to increase the efficiency and productivity of the company. The company or factory usually provide training to the workers, and then divide up working process and set a limited working time for the workers, the manager is responsible for the company and to make sure everything are on standard such as machines, tools, facilities and environment, and lead an increased productivity. Taylor theory mentioned the reward should base on the workers performance.

Fayol theory focuses on the specialization and the hierarchy of the company. Similar as scientific management, it classifies the working process to let people do. The main idea of Fayol theory is the 5 principles, which are plan, organize command, coordinated and control. Setting rules and discipline with centralization, to make sure processes are on the plan. It theory require a stable working environment, which means the company should avoid a high worker flowing. For the organization, all of the worker should be required working as a whole. The individual consideration should be far behind the company consideration.

Lyndall Urwick follows Taylor and Fayols theory, to combine and develop as his own theory. For Urwick, the cores of management are planning, organizing and control. Urwick theory is based on 8 main principles, which are the objective, harmony, explicit orders, workers have to follow orders, hierarchy with different level, narrow span of control, specialization, coordination. Some of them are really similar as Taylor and Fayols theory.

Foxconn, it is an electronic manufacturer in China with a higher ranking in the world. There are over 900,000 workers are working in Foxconn. For many years, Foxconn was the mainly partner (Supplier) of Apple, which is producing iPhone, iPad or other devices for Apple.Foxconn is using a part of Taylor and Fayol theory, which is setting up the rule and only focuses on the way to maximize the productivity. The weakness of Taylor and Fayol theory is being occurred from this case. Firstly, the organization does not have any informal structure, the relationship of the manager are all follow by the hierarchy. The employees can only follow the rules and gridline, and never have the chance to participate. Secondly, the workers as human machines or components in the company. As a part of organization, employees should be more likely as the soul of the company, because they performance are directly affect the company profit. This means the motivation and reward are really important to the employees.  

If want to know more about Foxconn, please click this website: http://sacom.hk/wp-content/uploads/2010/10/report-on-foxconn-workers-as-machines_sacom3.pdf