Bureaucratic Controls Such as Rules, Procedures, and Supervision, Inluding Pros and Cons
1. Discuss bureaucratic controls such as rules, procedures, and supervision, including pros and cons?
Bureaucratic controls are designed to measure progress toward set performance goals and if it is deemed necessary, to apply corrective measures to ensure that performance will achieve the manager 's objectives. Control systems will detect and correct significant variations in the results of planned activities. Rules, procedures, and supervision are all parts of bureaucratic control. They shape and regulate the behavior of divisions, functions, and individuals. Rules and procedures guide behavior and specify exactly what is expected of an employee when they confront an issue. It is the responsibility of the manager to develop rules that allow employees to perform their activities efficiently and effectively. That is where supervision comes into play. Supervision is important in making sure that the rules and procedures are being properly followed. You can have tons of rules at your job, but if no one is enforcing them, they are pretty much pointless. When employees follow the rules, their behavior is standardized. The actions are performed the same way each time something may occur. With a bureaucratic control system in place, managers can manage by exception and intervene if necessary. Some problems that may come from bureaucratic control include:
• Establishing rules is always easier than discarding them. If the amount of rules becomes burdensome, sluggishness can jeopardize an organization 's survival.
• Rules can constrain and standardize behavior. This can cause people to be so used to automatically following rules that they stop thinking for themselves. Innovation can become stifled with the use of extensive bureaucratic control.
• Bureaucratic control is most useful when organizational activities are routine and when employees are making programmed decisions. It is less useful where nonprogrammed decisions have to be made and managers have to react
Bureaucratic controls are designed to measure progress toward set performance goals and if it is deemed necessary, to apply corrective measures to ensure that performance will achieve the manager 's objectives. Control systems will detect and correct significant variations in the results of planned activities. Rules, procedures, and supervision are all parts of bureaucratic control. They shape and regulate the behavior of divisions, functions, and individuals. Rules and procedures guide behavior and specify exactly what is expected of an employee when they confront an issue. It is the responsibility of the manager to develop rules that allow employees to perform their activities efficiently and effectively. That is where supervision comes into play. Supervision is important in making sure that the rules and procedures are being properly followed. You can have tons of rules at your job, but if no one is enforcing them, they are pretty much pointless. When employees follow the rules, their behavior is standardized. The actions are performed the same way each time something may occur. With a bureaucratic control system in place, managers can manage by exception and intervene if necessary. Some problems that may come from bureaucratic control include:
• Establishing rules is always easier than discarding them. If the amount of rules becomes burdensome, sluggishness can jeopardize an organization 's survival.
• Rules can constrain and standardize behavior. This can cause people to be so used to automatically following rules that they stop thinking for themselves. Innovation can become stifled with the use of extensive bureaucratic control.
• Bureaucratic control is most useful when organizational activities are routine and when employees are making programmed decisions. It is less useful where nonprogrammed decisions have to be made and managers have to react
Cited: Bateman, Thomas S., and Scott A. Snell. Management Leading & Collaborating in a Competitive World. Tenth ed. New York: The McGraw-Hill Companies Inc, 2013. Print.