THE STRATEGIC ROLE OF MANAGEMENT SERVICES
| Pages | 60-67 |
| Date | 01 February 1973 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/eb055231 |
| Published date | 01 February 1973 |
| Author | Ray Gentle |
| Subject Matter | HR & organizational behaviour |
THE STRATEGIC ROLE
OF MANAGEMENT SERVICES
RAY GENTLE
Abstract
Management Services can be applied to any facet or
function of a business. Reducing costs, improving produc-
tivity and modernizing methods are its traditional roles.
Management Services is increasingly concerned with pro-
viding facilities whereby management can be more
effective. By modifying their systems and harnessing
personal motivation, companies adapt to their changing
environment. The paper argues that top management must
select a specific strategy from this wide range of options
and that systems development and personnel development
should be close allies in the process of continuous adapta-
tion.
Introduction
Systems development is an important and distinctive aspect
of a company's long-range plans. As this is recognized, the
role of Management Services becomes clear: it is to initiate
and manage a programme of change and improvement in
the way the company gets things done
—
its systems. The
object is to help the company to adapt profitably to its
changing social and technical environment.
The Company as a System
A company is a complex organization of people, equip-
ment, materials, resource conversion processes, and control
mechanisms. For all its complexity, this entity is purposive
and unified: it is a system.
In business circles the term 'system' often seems to carry
sinister connotations of bureaucracy and automatism.
There is no more need to feel uneasy about thinking of a
company as a system than in talking of the national
transportation system or the education system. The term
'system' refers to the whole which is greater than the sum
of the composite parts. It is concerned with relationships
between the diverse elements which make up a company. It
prompts scrutiny of the purpose of this whole. And it
facilitates analysis, criticism and improvement of the extent
to which this purpose is fulfilled.
The Company's Environment
No business can exist in a vacuum. A company exists as
part of a larger system which it subserves.
The continuing aim of a business enterprise is to achieve a
relationship with its environment which is 'profitable'.
Since the environment of the firm consists of various
groups of people - customers, suppliers, employees, trades
unions, shareholders, local and national government
—
this
relationship is certainly not mechanistic. Profit is the result
of achieving some overall balance between the satisfactions
offered to these groups of people, each having personal
objectives which conflict to some extent with the others'.
The essence of corporate planning is to focus management
attention on ways of improving these relationships
—
and
then actually to commit resources to improving them.
Corporate Strategy
Depending on their stage of development and the condition
of the market which they serve, companies will need to
apply widely differing strategies for achieving their objec-
tives.
How these underlying objectives are themselves
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