Administrative Management Theory

Our group project is on Henri Fayol’s “Administrative Management Theory”. As a group member I took on a task of researching his theory.

Henri Fayol began his career as a junior Engineer in French Mining Company. His key work was “Administration Industrielle et Generale” which he published in 1916 ad later o pulished in Eglish I 1949. The administrative theory "emphasized management functions and attempted to generate broad administrative principles that would serve as guidelines for the rationalization of organizational activities" (Scott p. 36). Fayol played a main role in the turn-of-the-century Classical School of management theory. Fayol believed that techniques of effective management could be defined and taught and that managerial organization hold as much importance as management as workers organization. He was the first to identify functions of management. The five functions of managers, according to Fayol were plan, organize, command, coordinate, and control. Planning is the act of anticipating the future and acting on it. “Planning reduces uncertainty by forcing managers to look ahead, anticipate change, consider the impact of change and develop appropriate responses.” (Robbins, 2000, p.247) Organization is the development of the institution's resources, including material and human. Commanding is keeping the institution’s actions and processes running. Co-ordination is the alignment and harmonization of the groups’ efforts. Finally, control means that the above activities are performed according to the appropriate rules and procedures. Fayol's work included a definition of a body of principles, which enabled a manager to construct a formal structure of the organization and to supervise it in a rational way. He focused his research and work on a more managerial level.

Fayol developed fourteen principals of management:

• Specialization/division of labor

• Authority with responsibility

• Discipline

• Unity of command

• Unity of direction

• Subordination of individual interest to the general interest

• Remuneration of staff

• Centralization

• Scalar chain/line of authority

• Order