Classical approaches:

F.w Taylor: Mechanical engineer: Scientific

management.
Henry Fayol: French Industrialist:
Administrative management
Max weber: German soicologist:
Bureaucracy.
Neo-classical approaches:
Human relations movement: Hawthorne’s
experiments by Elton mayo.
Behavioural approach: Management
scientists, Abraham Maslow, Douglas
Mcgregor and Kurt Lewin.
Modern approaches:
Quantitative approach
Systems approach
Contingency approach.
Adam smith: Division of labour.
Taylor’s scientific management:
1). Time and motion study(Stop watch): He
knew how piece work employees used to hold
back production to its one-third level because
they feared that their employers would cut
their piece rate as soon as there is rise in
production. The real trouble, no one knew
how much work it is reasonable to expect a
man to do. Thus, he started time and motion
study under which each motion of a job was
to be timed with the help of a stop watch.
Thus a best of way of doing the job was
found. This replaced old rule of thumb
knowledge of a foreman.
2). Differential payment(Taylor’s incentive
scheme): introduced differential piece work,
in which he linked incentives with
production. Under this plan a worker receive
low piece rate if he produced standard
number of goods and high rate if he
surpasses.
3). Scientific Recruitment and training.
4). Drastic reorganisation of supervision:
Two new concepts: 1). Separation of planning
and doing. 2). Functional foremenship.
There should be as many foreman as there
are special functions.
5). Friendly cooperation between mgmt and
workers: “A complete mental revolution”.
Taylor’s principles refined by Gantt and
Gilbreths.
Gantt- propounded the concept of motivation
Gantt introduced two new concepts to
taylor’s incentive scheme:
i). Every worker who finishes the assigned
workload was to win 50% of bonus for that
day.
ii). Foreman was to earn a bonus for each
worker who reached the standard and an
extra bonus if all workers reached the
standard.
Gantt also developed the idea of rating an
employee’s work publicly.
Gantt originated a charting system for
production control- Gantt charts.
Frank and Lilian Gilbreths: made motion and
fatigue study(motion cameras). They tried to
find most economical motions. He classified
all movements employed in industrial work
into 17 basic types called therbligs. The study
raised workers’ morale not only for their
physical benefits but also for management
concern for the workers.
Contributions of scientific mgmt:
1). Time and motion studies made us aware
that tools and physical movements involved
in a task can be made more efficient and
rational.
2). Found one best way of doing a job.
3). Jobs have become specialised and
standardised.
Taylor’s scientific mgmt has evolved into what
is now generally called job engineering. This is
concerned with product,process and tool
design; plant layout and standard operating
procedures, work measurement and
standards and work methods and human-
machine interactions.
Overhead costs: costs not directly related to
the manufacture of a product or delivery of a
service. Overhead costs are those that range
from administrative costs and rents to
marketing costs. Overhead refers to all non
labour expenses.
Criticisms: 1).Two separate individuals may
time the same job entirely differently.
2). Management of only muscular tasks at the
floor level and neglects the areas of problem
solving and decision making. March and
simon describe management as “Physiological
organisation theory”.
Administrative management: Henry Fayol:
French mining engineer turned a leading
industrialist.
General and Industrial administration book:
Henry fayol.
Fayol 14 principles of
administration/management are of general,
higher level and macro in nature unlike
taylor’s shop level and physical production
processes.
14 principles of management by Fayol:
1). Unit of Command and Unity of direction.
2). Scalar chain and subordination of
individual interest to General interest.
3). Initiative and espirit de corps(team spirit)
4). Division of work and discipline.
5). Authority, resposibility and order
6). Stability of tenure and equity
7). Remuration and centralisation.
Authority and responsibility: Formal power
(obtains from official position he holds) and
personal power( Intelligence, experience and
ability to lead).
Discipline: obedience to authority.
Unity of command: each employee should
receive instructions from one superior only
but one superior can send instructions to
multiple persons.
Unity of direction: There should be complete
identity bw individual and organisational
goals.
Scalar chain: means the hierarchy of
authority from the highest executive to the
lowest one for the purpose of
communication. But in case there is a need
for swift action. The chain can be short
circuited by making direct contact known as
“gang plank”.
Initiative: freedom to think out and execute a
plan.
Esprit de corps: means “team spirit”. To
achieve this, fayol suggested two things. One,
the motto of divide and rule should be
avoided and two, verbal communication.
Finally, both taylor and fayol had essentially
the same goal of “increasing production”.
Mooney and Railey: Principles of
organisation.
Urwick: Elements of administration:
combining taylor’s and fayol’s work.
According to urwick, The span of control
should never exceed 6. Authority can be
delegated but not responsibility.
Drawing inspiration from fayol, a new school
of thought emerged known as “ Management
Process school”- Koontz and Donnell.
Universalist approach: Management is not
culture bound.
As specialisation develops, the overhead costs
get increased.
Limited span of control was advocated by
Gulick and urwick etc.
Fayols principles result into the formation of
mechanistic(rigid) organisation structures
which are insensitive to the employees social
and psychological needs.
Hence, Taylor and Fayol(broadly classical
approaches) are based on the assumption
that organisations are closed systems.
Bureaucracy: Max weber – A german
sociologist.
3 types of administration:
1). Leader oriented: There is no delegation of
mgmt functions. Loyality to leader.
2). Tradition oriented: Mgmt positions are
handed down from generation to generation (
who you are matters rather than what you
can do).
3). Bureaucratic(Ideal type of administration):
delegation of mgmt responsibilities is based
on the person’s demonstrated ability. No
person can claim a position either b.c of his
loyalty to leader b.c the position has been
traditionally held by members of his family.
Features of Bureaucratic administration:
should not be governed by the personal
preferences and insists on following standard
rules. Institutional cult should replace
personality cult.
Bureaucracy can be viewed as logical
extension of mgmt when it becomes difficult
for one person to fulfil all mgmt functions.
The concept has enabled the most moden
large corporations which require functionally
specialised staff to train and control the ppl
with heterogeneous backgrounds and to
delegate specific responsibilities and
functions to them.
Limitations:
1). Overconformity to rules.
2). Buck passing: employees initiative is
stifled. In situations where there are no rules,
employees are afraid of taking decisions
independently fearing punishment.
Therefore, they pass the buck. As a result,
office work increases, and parkinson’s law
comes into operation.
3). Displacement of goals(first discovered by
german sociologist Robert michels) is a very
common phenomenon in a bureaucratic
organisation. It takes place when organisation
substitutes its original with goal for which it
was not created.
4). Employees develop Professional
automation: The means thus become more
important than the ends.
5). Rigid structure.
6).Neglect of Informal groups: An entirely
new discipline called “group dynamics” has
now come into existence which provides deep
insight into the formation and working of
these groups.
Finally, buck passing, professional
automation, goal displacement and neglect of
informal groups are limitations of
bureaucracy.
Neo- classical approaches: Because they
don’t completely reject classic theories but
only try to refine and improve them.
Human relations movement: Employees
don’t always follow predicted or
rational(based on reason rather than
emotions) patterns of behaviour.
So they believed that “People side” is there.
In Hawthorne experiments, Relay Assembly
Test room found that the production of group
had no relation with working
conditions(Illumination).
Bank wiring observation room: The effect of
informal group norms and economic
incentives on production.
Those who produce more than group norms-
rate busters.
Those who complain to supervisors-
Squealers.
Those who were too slow- chisellers.
Therefore, Informal group is dominant
because workers would produce that much
and nothing more than that, thereby
defeating incentive system. Artificial
restriction of production.
Hawthorne experiments revealed the
importance of informal groups in the working
of an organisation.
Contributions:
1).An organisation is therefore, not merely
techno economic system, but also a social
system.
2). There is no relation between improved
working conditions and high production.
3).Employee centred and democratic and
participative styple of leadership is more
effective than task- centred leadership.
4). The informal group is dominant and not
the individual.
5). A worker does not work for only financial
rewards but also for non financial rewards.
Limitations:
1). Over emphasizes symbolic rewards and
underplays the role of material rewards.
2). Taylor and fayol viewed task and
structure as their central tenets and ignored
the human variable.
Behavioural approach: Behavioural approach
is highly critical of the classical organisational
structures which are built around traditional
concepts. Behaviouralists prefer more
flexible organisation structures.
This approach recognises the practical and
situational constraints on human rationality
for making optimal decisions.
It says that, in actual practice, decision
making is done in a suboptimal manner. They
also attach great weightage to participative
and group decision making because business
problems are so complex that it is neither fair
nor feasible to make individuals responsible
for them.
They also underlines the desirability of
humanising administration of control process
and encourages the process of self direction
and control instead of imposed control.
Behavioural scientists are concerned with
studying organisations in the field and less
interested in establishing normative models.
To behavioural scientists, the realistic model
of human motivation is complex
man(Different people react differently). To
them, conflict is inevitable and sometimes is
even desirable.
Decision making- suboptimal manner
Humanising administration- self
direction/control rather than instead of
imposed control.
Complex man: conflict is inevitable/desirable.
Less interested in creating normative models.
Modern approaches:
1). Quantitative approach(decision making):
uses scientific methods for problem solving
and establishes normative models. Hence,
considered as a descendant of scientific mgmt
movement. Before this, Operations
research(OR) was the only quantitative
analysis. In OR the inter disciplinary groups of
mixed team of specialists employed for
making a decision. The team constructs a
mathematical model to simulate the problem.
Then anayses and makes the decision.
 A second method of quantitative analysis
is statistical methods like sampling theory and
probability theory(where sampling theory not
applicable).
Therefore, Quantitative approach is on
decision making. The approach has been
widely used in planning and control activities
where problems can be defined in
quantitative terms. But its use is still
uncommon in such areas as organising,
staffing, leading, directing where problems
are more human than technical in nature.
Systems approach(Integrated approach): A
common pitfall of the classical, behavioural,
quantitative schools is that they stress one
aspect of organisation.
Classical approach: task and structure.
Behaviroual: Ppl
Quantitative: Mathematical decision making.
Advocates are: chester barnard, herbert
simon.
1). A system is a set of interdependent parts:
4 independent parts: task, structure, people
and technology. The task refers to main
purpose raison de ‘etre of organisation.
2). Central systems approach is the concept
of holism: No part of the system can be
analysed isolating from whole system. Each
part affects the activity of every other part-
This is known as “Gestalt” in the psychology.
3). A system can be either open or closed:
Modern writers consider as open systems.
Synergy: output of a system is always more
than the combined output of its parts.
Nowadays, every organisation depends upon
external environment for information, energy
and material.

Every system has a permeable boundary.

Contingency approach: is the 2nd approach(1st
being the systems approach) that attempts to
integrate various schools of thought.
According to this view, mgmt principles and
concepts have no general and universal
applicability under all conditions. In other
words, there is no best way of doing things
under all conditions. Managers have to
develop situational sensitivity and practical
selectivity.
Scienctific mgmt: Task aspect.
Administrative mgmt: Universal principles of
mgmt.
Bureaucracy: Following standard rules.
Human relations: human aspect.
Behaviour: Practical and situational
constraints of human behaviour.
Quantitative approach: OR or mathematic
decision making.
Systems: Holism: everything depends on
every other thing.
Contingency: Integrate all previous
approaches: If- then approach.