13. Managerial Skills

Managerial Skills

Managers at every level in the management hierarchy must exercise three basic types of skills: technical, human, and conceptual. All managers must acquire these skills in varying proportions, although the importance of each category of skill changes at different management levels.

Managerial skills

Technical skills:

  • Technical skills refer to the ability and knowledge in using the equipment, techniques and procedure involved in performing specific tasks.
  • These skills require specialized knowledge and proficiency in the mechanics of a particular.
  • Technical skills lose relative importance at higher levels of the management hierarchy, but most top executives started out as technical experts.

Human skills:

  • Human skills refer to the ability of a manager to work effectively with other people both as individual and as members of a group.
  • Human skills are concerned with understanding of people.
  • These are required to win cooperation of others and to build effective work teams.

Conceptual skills:

  • Conceptual skills involve the ability to see the whole organization and the interrelationships between its parts.
  • These skills refer to the ability to visualize the entire picture or to consider a situation in its totality.
  • These skills help the managers to analyze the environment and to identify the opportunities.
  • Conceptual skills are especially important for top-level managers, who must develop long-range plans for the future direction of their organization.

Managerial Roles

To meet the many demands of performing their functions, managers assume multiple roles. A role is an organized set of behaviors. Henry Mintzberg has identified ten roles common to the work of all managers.

The ten roles are divided into three groups:

  • Interpersonal
  • Informational
  • Decisional

The performance of managerial roles and the requirements of these roles can be played at different times by the same manager and to different degrees depending on the level and function of management. The ten roles are described individually, but they form an integrated whole.

Managerial roles

1. Interpersonal Roles

The interpersonal roles link all managerial work together. The three interpersonal roles are primarily concerned with interpersonal relationships.

  • Figurehead Role: The manager represents the organization in all matters of formality. The top level manager represents the company legally and socially to those outside of the organization. The supervisor represents the work group to higher management and higher management to the work group.
  • Liaison Role: The manger interacts with peers and people outside the organization. The top level manager uses the liaison role to gain favors and information, while the supervisor uses it to maintain the routine flow of work.
  • The leader Role: It defines the relationships between the manger and employees.

2. Informational Roles

The informational roles ensure that information is provided. The three informational roles are primarily concerned with the information aspects of managerial work.

  • Monitor Role: The manager receives and collects information about the operation of an enterprise.
  • Disseminator Role: The manager transmits special information into the organization. The top level manager receives and transmits more information from people outside the organization than the supervisor.
  • Spokesperson Role: The manager disseminates the organization’s information into its environment. Thus, the top level manager is seen as an industry expert, while the supervisor is seen as a unit or departmental expert.

3. Decisional Roles

The decisional roles make significant use of the information and there are four decisional roles.

  • Entrepreneur Role:  The manager initiates change, new projects; identify new ideas, delegate idea responsibility to others.
  • Disturbance Handler Role:  The manager deals with threats to the organization. The manager takes corrective action during disputes or crises; resolve conflicts among subordinates; adapt to environmental crisis.
  • Resource Allocator Role:  The manager decides who gets resources; schedule, budget set priorities and chooses where the organization will apply its efforts.
  • Negotiator Role:  The manager negotiates on behalf of the organization. The top level manager makes the decisions about the organization as a whole, while the supervisor makes decisions about his or her particular work unit.

Effectiveness of a manager’s activity depends on certain important skills. These skills can be divided into seven different categories:

1. A conceptual skill is the ability of a manager to see the “general picture” of an organization. Managers must understand how their duties and the duties of other managers fit together to plan their activity in a proper way and get the required results.

2. A decision making skill is the ability of a manager to choose the best course of actions of two or more alternatives. Managers are responsible for the most important decision which are required to carry out any organizational activity.

3. An analytic skill is the ability to determine the most important problem of many other problems and identify the causes of each problem before implementing a proper action plan.

4. An administrative skill is the ability of a manager to keep to the organizational rules specified for the production process, within a limited budget, and coordinate the flow of information and paper work in his group and in other groups.

5. A communication skill is the ability of a manager to share his ideas and opinions with other people both orally and in writing. This skill is a decisive factor of a manager’s success.

6. An interpersonal skill (psychological skill) is the ability to deal effectively with other people both inside and outside the organization. It is the ability to understand the needs and motives of other people. This skill is very important for a good psychological atmosphere for successful activity in the common work in future.

7. A technical skill is a specific competence to accomplish a task. The lower is a manager’s level in the organization, the closer is his/her connection with the production process, but the knowledge of the technical sphere is useful for all the managers.

Asked to define the ideal leader, one can also emphasize such traits as self-awareness and self-regulation. People with a high degree of self-awareness know their weaknesses and aren’t afraid to talk about them. People with self-regulation trait are able to control their impulses or even channel them for good purposes.