The Four Function of Management

Abstract

I will be providing an overview of the four functions of management and how it relates to the agency I am currently employed with, the South Carolina Department of Health and Environmental Control (SC DHEC).

Based on what I have read in Management: The New Competitive Landscape (2004) I find that my agency is typical in many ways. We have multiple layers of management:

1. SC DHEC Director

a. Assistant Agency Director

i. Region 1 Health Director

1. Region 1 Administrator

a. Region 1 System Coordinator

i. Region 1 BabyNet System Manager

1. BabyNet Administrative Support

My job function in this multi-layer organization is BabyNet Administrative Support. I will detail how the four functions of management relate to my agency, supervisor, and position.

Management

Management as defined in the Random House Webster's College Dictionary (Random House, Inc. 1992) as "1. The act or process of managing. 2. Skill in managing; executive ability. 3. The persons controlling and directing an enterprise; executives. 4. Such persons considered as a class." A shorter definition is the "Process of working with people and resources to accomplish organizational goals." Management: The New Competitive Landscape (2004).

Management has four basic functions Ð'- planning, organizing, leading, and controlling Ð'- also known as the fundamental management principles. Even though business has changed over the years these basic fundamentals have remained constant. The four basic fundamentals have evolved in many ways and some have noted a fifth, evaluating, but the principals have remained the same.

Some of the new terms:

The Old Functions of Management The New Functions of Management

Planning Planning

Organizing Organizing

Leading Motivating or Empowering

Controlling Facilitating

Evaluating Innovating

Learning

http://www.charleswarner.us/mgtfunct.html

Fundamental Management Principles

Lets look at each principle as defined in our text - Management: The New Competitive Landscape (2004) then I will see where it fits in my agency.

1. "Planning Ð'- The management function of systematically making decisions about the goals and activities that an individual, a group, a work unit, or the overall organization will pursue in the future."

a. This is one of the most important functions our agency does. We meet as a whole to determine our six-year strategic plan. The upper management team, Regional Leadership Team (RLT), comes together to decide the long-terms goals for the next six years. Once these goals have been determined each area meets with the next level of management to determine our short-term goals. Then the lower-levels of management meet to determine the services and processes we are gong to use over the next six years. As an added step, once the final strategic plan is put together it is submitted to the state leadership team to compile for a statewide strategic plan. Teamwork is an important part of this function.

2. "Organizing Ð'- the management function of assembling and coordinating human, financial, physical, informational, and other resources needed to achieve goals."

a. Another part of our strategic plan is determining the needs of our agency to achieve the goals that we have decided on. As a region our Administrator requires each department supervisor to review the budget, review personnel needs, and to check equipment and supplies that is needed to function on a daily basis; then submit a report to him with the findings. He will then take the reports from each, review and analyze them to compile another report to submit to the RLT.

b. As far as the Region 1 BabyNet program, if we are to meet the federal guidelines required to provide the services to the infants in our program we have to be extremely organized. We have a timeline to get referrals processed, make home visits' with the parents,