The concept of the holistic management as a new approach in the theory of management Jan Porvaznik,

Jan Porvaznik, 

 University of Economics in Bratislava, Faculty of Business

Management, Department of Management

2011

 

 

Online at http://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/57444/

MPRA Paper No. 57444, posted 21. July 2014 00:23 UTC

 

 

THE CONCEPT OF THE HOLISTIC MANAGEMENT AS A NEW APPROACH IN THE THEORY OF MANAGEMENT

 

The types of objects scientifically researched and the types of sciences used for research till recently are now questioned after the crisis of contemporary science. Classical management which was based on traditional science is also thereby questioned and is getting gradually supplemented if not replaced by  Holistic management. The knowledge pillar of management, the application pillar of management, social pillar of management have to be seen in this context. Holistic intelligence (HQ), knowledge intelligence (KQ), application intelligence (AQ), social intelligence (SQ) are some of the new terms in operation now. As management is basically human mangement and with whatever expansion is originally and finally aimed at solving human problems, so Holistic management and its role in solving the contemporary problems of mankind. (Prof. Ing. Ján Porvazník, CSc University of Economics in Bratislava, Slovakia.)

 

Even though Science started with an original aim 'To make human life easier and simpler, and give it sense by means of a unifying explanation.’ It has failed to do so  as technology progressed in leaps and bounds.

 

Some of the questions often asked and yet unanswered are:

•     The sense and object of life,

•     Human essence and how to achieve it,

•     Priority of values, ethical and moral,

•     Right or justice in the distribution of production,

•      Management and organizations of society

•     And others.

As the complexity of life and the pinch of above questions is increasing willingness and ability of people to manage them is disappearing. Climate change, overpopulation, overproduction, pollution, plundering of nature, globalization, etc. are some of the other issues in question.this is the cause of the multidisciplinary crisis in the system (culture, civilisation) which is unable to cope up with its own speed, products and experiences.

 

 

 

 

It is essential to ensure a socially responsible behaviour and a sustainable development of economical units (companies) and it is by now clear that this also depends on many non economic or non business units like state organisations-educational and medical facilties and instituitons, ministries, municipalities, institutions or authorities, cultural facilities, etc. The knowledge about them and the way individual cognition and perception is affected by them is the matter of a new science and management. These organizations can be managed on business principles, but also as non-profit organisations or civic associations. In the fulfilment of their mission, they can manage either the public or state means, oral so a combination with business.  The diversity of the missions of such  organizations  creates  major difficulties in the creation of knowledge about these units.

In a simplified way, we can say that the ‘knowledge about the mission and basis of economical units is contained in a science called Economics.’ The use of this knowledge is connected with the questions what and for whom to produce, which products to produce, and how to produce them. “The mission of science is not only to know the objects-to form the system of knowledge about objects that turn through knowledge into the complexes of individual sciences, but to use the acquired knowledge in favour of the long-term sustainable development of human society.”

 

  The object and subjects of holistic management

 

management is one of the social sciences, in reality management is a multidisciplinary science as both the formation and use of management knowledge are greatly nurtured and groomed by the  knowledge  from  the  technical  and  natural  sciences.  Cybernetics, is defined by Norbert Wiever as science about control and reporting within living organisms and machines. Cybernetics  and  the  use  of  its  knowledge  for  management objects, makes management also multidisciplinary science. with inputs from natural, technical, and social sciences

Recalling the functions as given by Henry Fayol, namely, anticipation, planning, organizing, ordering, control and coordination are accepted all over. However many specialists felt that among these controlling is main function and there is quite a difference of opinion about what and how many should be control functions. Only recently there is an understanding that management is different from control and in fact is much more than it. It also has much wider context than only for economic units or organizations.  

“The knowledge of general management formed (or created) on systematic principles  and  applied  to  units  of  any nature (entrepreneurial  and  non- entrepreneurial, public, legal, or non-profit organizations) is the basis for holistic management theory, or more simply, holistic management.”

 Model of the Elements and Parts of the Unit in Organizational Management

 

holistic management object as being as a comprehensive, integrated, and complex system of knowledge about the properties, skills and attainments of management subjects.

 

  •             In addition to professional knowledge and practical skills, there is social   maturity   of management subjects

•     “Consider every individual, every man to be a subject of management.

Every man through being a member of certain group has a possibility himself to manage his work, tasks, and personal life. This means that he can plan what does he want to do; organize how he wants to live; realize the fulfilment of his plans; and assess the level of his plans and fulfilment thereof. “

The above described postulates (paradigms) enable us to define the object of holistic management.

Thus the system consists of :

•     General and professional knowledge,

•     Practical and application skills,

•     Personal and human qualities.

distinguishing parts of it are :

• PersonalManagement,

• TeamManagement

• Managementoftheorganization.

 

To reiterate the main points it is

•     Professional ability – attainments – what they know,

•     Practical skills – the ability to apply the attainments – what they can do,

•     Social maturity – personal qualities – how they shall be,

 

The following seven points shall help to guide our understanding and characterization of the term competence: (………)

1.   French  author  L.  Paguay5    understands  competence  as  the  system  of declarative procedural and conditional knowledge organized into procedural rules (operative scheme) enabling one to distinguish (identify) and solve problems.

2.  The competence of a management subject is given (determined) by the extent of his ability to apply, concurrently, and holistically, human attitudes  (social  maturity),  professional  knowledge  (theoretical attainments), and practical usefulness (acquired experience and skills) for the identification and solving of problems

3.   The above determination and study of the literature dedicated to competence

demonstrates that the capability of the man is prevailingly his individual dimension, which is exclusively the "personal affair" of the management subjects, i.e., of each of us. The reason is that every man disposes with so called tacit knowledge (knowledge that characterizes only him, his makeup and it cannot be shared with anybody else). Also the knowledge acquisition process – education with the objective of achieving the relevant necessary competence level (it means education, study and training processes) are specific to each of us.

4.   The term capability has its origin in the activities of people connected with the world of work, and the level and quality of its execution. However, it applies today also to capability in either personal or social life.

5.   The capability of management subjects can, and has to be, evaluated. Great attention is paid to the evaluation of managerial competence in the theory of management.  It  is  the  effort  of  professionals  to  express  the  level  of managerial competence of individual subjects, where the major attentions is paid to the evaluation of their IQ level and skills, so called application intelligence by which we evaluate the ability to use the attainments (AQ).

Our  effort  is  to  evaluate  the  holistic  manager  competence  (intelligence), which also includes also the evaluation of personal qualities originating from

 

 

 

the  emotional  qualities  of  the  man.  It  means  that  holistic  intelligence  is expressed as CQ=IQ,AQ,EQ.

6.   the evaluation of the measure of managerial competence, principles, and methods of assessment. Here, we will state that the determination appears in the professional literature of:

•     Basic competence rate,

•     Higher competence rate and,

•     Developed competence rate.

7. The requirements come up to the level of complex organizations with complicated structures but also the parts there of, in the professionalizing of the manager profession. This means that this profession should be carried out exclusively by persons who have received a relevant certificate based on the assessment. It is expected that holistic management theory will elaborate the managerial skills expected from managers on individual level.

 

The classification of the knowledge of individual competence pillars

 

the competence pillars are:

•     Knowledge of the social maturity of management subjects,

•     Knowledge of the professional ability of management subjects,

•     Knowledge of the application skills of management subjects.

 

The Social Maturity Pillar, based on the personal qualities of management subjects is composed of:

•     Knowledge of character qualities,

•     Knowledge of creative and discrimination qualities,

•     Knowledge of temperament qualities,

• Knowledge of somatic qualities. Simply structured, it is the knowledge of:

•     character,

•    discrimination and creativity.

•    temperament, and...

•     somatic.

The pillar of practical skills based on the application and abilities acquired by practice of the management is created by:

•     knowledge of communication abilities,

•     knowledge of motivation abilities,

•     knowledge  of  the  capability  to  work  in  team  and  skills  of  team building,

•     knowledge of personal management (self and time management). Again, put simply, this is the knowledge of:

• communication,

•     motivation,

•     teamwork,

•     self and time control.

The professional efficiency pillar based on the attainments (or knowledge)

of the management subjects consists of:

•     knowledge of methodology and system thinking,

•     knowledge of controlled units (objects),

•     knowledge of functions of control,

•     knowledge of information for the control.

 

It is required from the management subject to have the necessary attainments (knowledge) about the findings of system thinking, object of control, functions, and information of control.

 

 

 

 

 

 Manifestations  and  consequences  of  the  exercise  of  holistic  managerial competence in organizational practice

 

“At the beginning of management science in the 20th century, two pillars were emphasized: professional efficiency and practical skills. The new century emphasizes social maturity as the most important competence pillar for management subjects (owners, managers, employees) in economic units.”

 

 “The power is located in all of workers of an organization and in the rate of their competence. The power of the organization is in addition to the owners, and is created above all by the competent managers and employees working in it. The idea that even in the new millennium these people will be owned by shareholders is simply immoral7.”

A company never belongs exclusively to its owners or shareholders and to enable the employees to speak about their own destiny. The classical, view though still persisting on management as activity (process, position) and managers are given the dominant position. To know the quality and effectiveness of the behavior of the organization we should know their competence rate. However, this view is already  obsolete and insufficient for the new cognitive society.

Managerial competence is of both owners10  and employees and  freedom and respect for the individual, is a must. To be a competent

owner, an employee  will  have  the  same  importance as an executive  for  the  organization.

This new vision and value is then expanded for not just an individual, department or organization but for the municipality, region, state, and that depends on the rate of the competence to create such value. The growth of an individual is also helpful for the growth of an organization. “The more competent he will be, the more useful he will be for the organization. Already today and even more in the future, the competence is not given by the function alone. Capability or competence shall be understood as readiness of the management subject to control and manage his or her own work and work of the others so that it results in real added value rate (i.e. set the objectives, implement and evaluate them in a way to provide the success of the organization.”

 

 

"Wherever you work, you are not an employee. You are working for only one employer – yourself -. Nobody is obliged to secure your professional career. You own it. The key to survival is to create another value every day9." ( At the 30th  International conference of the Association Management Centre Europe Association in April 1998, in Vienna, Andrew Crove, the general director of INTEL)

 

Every dimension of managerial competence has two counter-poles – two extremes, one positive, useful; the other negative,

 

 

practical skills  positive is cleverness (mastery). Its negative, adverse manifestation is hap-handedness (inability).

Professional efficiency as a manager dimension is, in a positive meaning of the  word,  is  wisdom  (understanding,  know-how)  and  in  the negative meaning of the word, characterized as ignorance (stupidity, sophistry).

The positive aspect of social maturity as the most characteristic dimension of the new millennium is wisdom (capability to live also for others); the negative is

egoism.

a  unique  equation  (transformation)  of  the  philosophy  of  positive  and negative competence in management.

 

WISDOM – SANITY – CLEVERNESS                   ^ GOOD EGOISM – IGNORANCE – UNABILITY                   ^ WRONG

 

Management in its holistic approach emphasizes that the meaning of human existence should have a focus on good, truth, harmony, beauty, trust, humaneness, streaming of man to live and sacrifice also for others. Why in the today’s world  humaneness and wisdom are on the wane, and egoism (selfishness) predominates? This needs to be seen with root cause analysis

.

Only those things make sense where one can create, where he, by means of his work and life, add new value to the

 

existing ones; in other words, what he has enough force, will and competence for. The world of work and the course of working processes, naturally personifies chaos and is managed by chance (incidentally). And this fact represents the natural resource of human productivity.

Man's spirituality, his wisdom, and in this sense also his life and work philosophy, is represented through, and is as endless as the universe, because man is a part of it. In the future millennium, the uniqueness, and both the simultaneity and temporality of life, should inspire in each owner, manager and employee the most exalted relationships to their collaborators. The awareness of the fact of annihilation of man in nature and man's short stay in this world should motivate him to such behaviour.

The ability to perceive, get to know and feel beauty and consequently also good should play an important role in the new millennium. This is especially due to the fact that beauty in the best meaning of the word cannot be bad, as good cannot be ugly.

The current development of mankind reassures us that there is no simple recipe against the devastation of the human soul. The question echoes from this, why in today's world, bad prevails over good. The answer is complicated, but its economical dimension consists in the non-democratic use of property and ownership relationships. And this is also the answer to the question why management in the dimension of competence in the social maturity area is considered to be a philosophy. It is known that people, in whatever working position they occupy, can be motivated to be competent either by personal interest or wider public interest.

All those holding the view that only the personal interest can motivate people to work competently are in general right that one who wants to survive must continuously care only about one self. Even, especially the practically oriented politicians affirm that "people are motivated by private interests and effort to gain power and riches10."

However, there are also other who are not motivated only by their personal interest but also by public affairs. These people usually want to be part of something bigger than themselves. Together with others, they want to contribute to the creation of something that would serve many people. Their needs far exceed their personal interest and they cover not only their own families but also communities, institutions, countries, and in certain cases, also the world. Good is in a continuous

fight with the bad, like wisdom with immaturity, sanity with ignorance, cleverness with inability. Both good and bad are philosophical terms, the same as management in the position of social maturity dimension is a philosophy. The attainments enable management subjects to be professionally efficient; they are the theory. In the dimension of professional efficiency, management is a science. But in the dimension of practical skills, management is an art. The door is open wide in the new millennium to an increase in the competence of management. The aim of education should be to bring  predominance of good over bad. Every  healthy, normal man willing to be educated and being workable has the potential to achieve a certain degree of competence in control. The time will come when the division in the world will be into the educated and uneducated, competetnt and non competent and not rich and poor.Social maturity can be achieved by education, professional efficiency by study, and practical skills by training.