LE01

In the first lecture of 'Principles of Management' by Dr Prasad, initially explained how important is to relate classroom theories with the Real world. He further discussed about the importance of practical market experience to the management students to become a successful entrepreneur rather remain as mere manager. Adding to this he introduced  the event started by him called ‘Mandi’, in which the students get an opportunity to experience the scenario of direct sales of toys, which are fun filled knowledge enhancing toys made by the NGO.  During this 'Mandi' program students travel to different parts of Mumbai and try to sell these educational toys which gives a real time market experience to the students. He is renowned as Dr Mandi through this event. He also explained in detail the slogan of Mandi…

                Soacho.. Becho !  Becho.. Seekho ! !   Seekho .. Soacho ! ! !

                               

The basic thing that I learnt is one should think beyond the box and should have a practical knowledge about the market to become a successful businessman, in any Business. The conceptual approach of teaching how to become a successful entrepreneur is inspiring and I believe the concept of registering a company by the students as suggested by Dr Mandi , will make me learn not only to register a company but also different aspects of starting a new enterprise.

   After teaching us about the importance of thinking like a businessman, he made us to participate in a group exercise.






GOAL SETTING -TOWER BUILDING

This activity is mainly concentrating on setting of goals and proper management of available resources to achieve that goal.

At the beginning of the activity he gave a cube and asked to set their own goal of making a tower of such cubs having a single base cub. Most of them decreased their previously set goals after listening to the rules to be followed while building the tower which include blind folding and usage of ODD hand. By this he meant to convey to us that setting of a goal depends on different parameters. At this point he taught us the principle of S.M.A.R.T in goal setting….

S.M.A.R.T. is an acronym for the 5 steps of specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-based goals. It’s a simple tool used by businesses to go beyond the realm of fuzzy goal-setting into an actionable plan for results.

 

 Dr Mandi had related the above principle to the activity by dividing the task into three different groups as working executives, Middle Management and Top Management. He explained the importance of these three groups in building an organization which he related to building of a tower with three people.

Tower Team with Dr Mandi

         Ø   The session was completely inspiring starting with, what it takes to become a thorough Manager           

               and successful Entrepreneur.

         Ø  It was successful in demonstrating the principles of goal setting and behavior and coordination of 

              different levels (Executives, HR, Top management) in an organization to achieve a particular goal.

        Ø  It also shown a clear picture how various factors influence in reaching the goals set by the organization

             to achieve its missions. 

LE02

Theory X  & Theory Y Manager

Pygmalion phenomena is commonly observed in all fast growing companies. A classic example of Pygmalion effect. High expectation kept us motivated to slog hard and finish it spectacularly. However manager should remain cautious. There is a fine line between realistic high expectation and unrealistic target. Unrealistic target brings in frustration and affects productivity.

Theory X and Theory Y are solely about managers. It is based on assumptions of manager. The most dangerous situation to organisation is when workers dislike work and manager assumes that workers are not lazy.This is because workers are lazy but manager designs his policies based on his false assumption which further deteriorates condition.The best scenario is when workers like their work and manager assumes that workers are not lazy. This synchronization benefits the organisation. 


Theory X type 1 Example: 

 Worker dislikes the work and manager assumes that workers are lazy.

When I was leading a team of the project in my company. Two of them really disliked the software testing work given to them. I realised it soon though they never told. I discovered that they used to think testing as lowly job.So I pushed them hard to take complete ownership of their job and gave them opportunity to directly present their work to seniors, though I kept track of all they used to do. This new responsibility improved their performance considerably.Thus I employed idea based on assumption that they were unwilling to do the job

Theory X type 2  : 

 Worker really like the work but manager assumes that they are lazy

This is  responsible for many of the company switching done by IT professional. Workers are really talented and desire to handle more responsibilities but manager based on its assumption doesn't assign much work . This disheartens ambitious engineers and they switch to other company for better technology and work.

Theory Y type 1  :   

When worker really dislikes the work and manager assumes that worker is not lazy.

In between two projects I was on bench for couple of weeks.I was assigned some mundane Excel sheet work by my bench manager. I thoroughly disliked the work but I didn't want to give him the impression so I finished initial few on time. I was then overloaded with more Excel work and that thing so disheartened me that I contemplated switching job but thankfully I soon got into  another project.

Theory Y type 2  :

 When worker really likes the work and manager assumes that worker is not lazy.

I really enjoyed being the team lead in one of my project. I worked very hard and continuously kept motivating my team. This was acknowledged by my manager by an appreciation mail but what encouraged me more was more responsibility given by the manager. This not only motivated me more to work hard for the organisation but also helped in shaping my career.