Are the Classical Functions Put Forward by Henri Fayol in 1949 Still Valid and True Today?

Asforthe word ‘management’, there has been long debate about its meaning. For our purpose, we take the perspective of the functions that managers

18. Henri Fayol classified management functions into five categories. ANS: T PTS: 1 TOP: AACSB Reflective Thinking DIF: Easy KEY: Creation of Value

1. Read `Spotlight on Management` on pages 133-149 and the practice lesson `The Real World` on page 152. Please discuss the following questions in detail.  Your response to each question should consist of:  a minimum word count of 250 words and at least three (3) scholarly sources (1 resource can be the textbook):

The theory of management has been developing since time began – in the tribal days, hunts had to be organised, in the Victorian era the construction of the railways had to be managed; and nowadays every organisation globally has to be organised. One of the first ‘schools’ of management was the Classical Theory – this focused on getting the most out of each employee following a strict structure of management – Henri Fayol is one of the most famous Classical Theorists and his quote - “to manage is to forecast and plan, to organize, to command, to co-ordinate and to control” – summarises his main points of how managers should remain in authority and carry out their jobs. Although there are also other schools of management such as the Human Relations Theory. This is a far softer approach and concentrates on each employees emotional and physical needs – it looks at them as a valuable resource to the business – not just as a means to an end.

The administrative management viewpoint evolved early in the 1900s and is most closely identified with Henri Fayol (1841-1925), a French industrialist. Fayol’s work, “Administration industrielle et générale (1916)”, later translated into the 1949 “General and industrial administration”, is one of the first and most widely quoted analyses on management. As a result, Fayol influenced many writers, most notably Urwick. Although, there have been many theories supporting Fayol’s ideas, but there have been many writers who have directly opposed Fayol, the most prominent one being Henry Mintzberg, who in his “The Nature of Managerial Work (1973)” regarded Fayol’s ideas as “folklore”. The aim of this essay is to evaluate the works of both Fayol and Mintzberg, discussing the pros and cons of both the theories. Moreover, the essay will depict that how Fayol has been able to withstand “the test of time” and prove that his theory cannot be termed as “folklore”.

This paper will start off by comparing, and contrasting the role of the manager and a

Critically, an early pioneer of this managerial structure within organisations was Henri Fayol. Fayol devised a ‘common sense’ view of the managerial responsibilities

Henri Fayol’s theory was almost a century old and was originally written in French. Further review on several journal articles has led to an overview background of Fayol’s working life which provided the foundation that conceptualized his theory. According to Wren (2001), Fayol was appointed as the Director in a mining company, Decazeville, where he succeeded to turnaround the company to become profitable. Fayol was the first person to classify the functions of a manager’s job. Fayol (1949; as cited in Wren, 2001) identified five key functions in managerial works.as planning, organising, command, coordination and control. Planning consists of any managerial work that involves setting goals and coordinating actions to

Despite the numerous research conducted based on managerial processes, elaborating on ‘what management do’ is a debatable task since organizations are very unique and the task done by the management in these organizations differ from one another. But most of these researches agree on common set of functions which are shared by the executives of the modern-day corporation (Robbins, DeCenzo,2012, Pg.8). As suggested by the French industrialist Henri Fayol in the early twentieth century management process consist of; planning, organizing, commanding, coordinating and controlling. However, scholars who researched on this topic during the recent years has condensed all functions mentioned by Fayol into; planning, organizing, leading and controlling (Waren, Bedeian, Breeeze,2002, Pg. 908-910). Every organization strive to achieve either the

The paper will explore different theories of Management, include Henri Fayol and Henry Mintzberg. This section of this paper provides an overview of functions, roles and skills required of a manager. What is Management? Management can define as the process of reaching organisational goals by working with and through people and other organisational resources. (Management Innovation, 2008).

Early management theories adopted by such proponents as Henri Fayol, Mary Parker Follett and Max Weber are relevant in todays’ world. In this essay I am going to discuss about all three theorists and how their theories are still relevant for managers in the 21st century in meeting the challenges. In the classical approach to management there are three branches under it. They are, scientific management, administrative principles and bureaucratic organisation. Henry Fayol and Mary Parker Follett developed theories for administrative principles and Max Weber developed a theory for bureaucratic organisation (Schermerhorn et al. 2014, p.36). First we will be going through Henri Fayol and then Mary Parker Follett as they both made theories

Henri Fayol (1841-1925), was ‘’famous for the classical school of management, which emphasises command and control’’. (Robinson, 2005) He is deemed to be one of the founders of general management; also referred to as the administrative theory and later on becoming known as ‘Fayolism’.

In 1919, for the first time the world were introduced to the idea of management by Henri Fayol when the book Administration Industrielle et Générale – Prévoyance, Organisation, Commandement, Coordination, Contrôle was published. This is one of the earliest books explicitly discuss about management. Henri Fayol (1841-1925) was a very successful businessman with more than 30 years experiences as a managing director. In his book, Fayol defines management as comprising five functions: planning, organising, co-ordinating, commanding and controlling. While he has his modern critics, his approach to management continues to have appeal (Witzel, 2003). However Henry Mintzberg (2000), in his article The manager’s job: Folklore and fact has

Henri Fayol: Henri Fayol was administrative management’s most articulate spokesperson. A French industrialist, Fayol was unknown to U.S. managers and scholars until his most important work, General and Industrial Management, was translated into English in 1930. 16 Drawing on his own managerial experience, he attempted to systematize the practice of management to provide guidance and direction to other managers. Fayol also was the first to identify the specific managerial functions of planning, organizing, leading, and controlling. He believed that these functions accurately reflect the core of the management process. Most contemporary management books still use this framework, and practicing managers agree that these

Modern management principals are still based upon Fayol’s functions, Mintzberg’s roles and Katz ‘s skills even though they have been around for a long time in our dynamic environment. This is evident if you firstly understand what Fayol’s functions, Minzberg’s roles and Katz’s skills actually are and you look into new management texts and businesses.