Introduction
Corporate vertical command and control have been considered to be the best ways to solve many of the daily affairs of the organization. The chairman of Toyota who visited a reputed home appliance company said:
“The management of your company gave me a good feeling. It has already had distinctive features of ‘top-down’ implementation of the system and it is also delicate and special However, from the trend of knowledge times, there is no denying that the company should consider the bottom-up administrative management” (Grundke, 2010, p. 662).
The vertical management style of the organization adapts to modern enterprise management concepts. This article first introduces the changeable vertical management approach from ancient to now. The main part of this essay focuses on the advanced concepts by citing several successful examples. It also introduces some of the different concepts of the people from different countries and gives some suggestions for the current management methods. Lastly, it will make a final summary for this essay.
Importance of Management Concepts
With the changing times, the organizational structure has gradually evolved from top-down power and bottom-up report to top-down targets and bottom-up dynamics (Forelle, 2010). The organizational form has changed from the linear system to the line functions of the system the staff are not only users of “thought”, but also the creators. The staff should not only be the followers of the “instructions”, but also be the people who identify and solve problems. Staff should change the role of screws and gears in the engine. The “top-down” management model should be used to change. The concept of Siemens is “putting the staff into the entire production process”, while one of Toyota’s management features considers the employee as ultimately responsible for their posts. The members of Self-management teams and groups should be responsible for inventory planning, materials planning, personnel arrangements, production targets and product quality in the implementation of the process. In this way, it will present a new pattern of “down cycle, blend run” in the organization and give the organization a new vitality (McCormick, 2010, p. 8).
In today’s instant success of morals, implementation of top-down command and control is of particular importance. Everybody should stop and think carefully about the corporate culture, values, etc. it should only promote active participation in and strengthen the organization from the leadership before mobilizing the workers to participate in this activity to get to inspire them. In addition, to actively participate in and promote leadership, the leadership of personal behaviour, words and style of temperament, professional diligence, honesty, dealing with others is more important for the top-down implementation of the corporate philosophy of education. As a representative of the main leader of this sector, it stands for the image of the company. If the leader conceals, corrupts and degenerates the department must be headed for a complete mess, dead, down fool, and economic downturns. Even if he only sees something with one eye, engages in the trick treachery, as well as engages in small groups of a clique, legalistic obstinacy, etc. It can also cause gentleman silence, talent emigrated, and sector stagnated, management confusion, inefficiency and infighting, Mausoleum. He might make “a little” harsh points on the person and do not understand clearly hastily release views and decision-making (Anonymous, 2009, p. 805). He was usually strict with his subordinates and the general staff. There is some unfair distribution on staff. For example, the manager of the company may be unequal on the matter of salary, which will undoubtedly lead to a great deal of mess in the company and accordingly the heart of the staff and the mind of the staff may also be very passive which will result in the decrease of production unstable quality bad performance of the concerned department and the poor image. Hence, it is very important to improve the behavior and action of the manager and we can see that the administrative approach is very important in the management of the company.
Chairman of Lenovo Group ever said: “The newly established company used a ‘top-down’ method of leadership and management team, which is what we call ‘prescriptive’ approach; when we entered into the ’90s, with a number of high-quality young men coming into the company, I changed the previous prescriptive way to the so-called ‘directive’ approach; after 1995, I have gradually beginning changing the working method into the participate way, which connotes that the subordinate staff put forward decision and I provide advice. Hence, the staff surrounding me begins to possess a very large stage, on which the staff can decide by themselves, and my function becomes a film-maker from a director” (Anonymous, 2009, p. 805)
Opposed Views
Different countries have a different view to the top-down management style regime. In the Western capitalist countries, the state power is accustomed to implementing the separation of powers which is similar to the functions of straight line of a modern enterprise system. While in the socialist countries the countries implement one-party rule which is similar to straight line of the modern enterprise system, for they think that a straight-line function of the system is slow in response to the external environmental changes, departments are lack of horizontal coordination among organizations are lack of innovation and the system has limited knowledge of organizational goals and other gaps. However, the advantages of linear systems are: relatively simple structure, accountability and order reunification. The disadvantage of the system is that it is lack of professional management since there was no division of labor, and the system requests that the executive responsible person must be proficient in a variety of knowledge and handle a number of operational issues personally.
Recommendations
The Implementation of Responsibilities
Dynamic organization must have the powers and responsibilities to the hands of each of the various positions especially the bottom rather than float on top even not concentrate in the hands of an individual. It shifts the responsibility from the hands of the leadership together with the power and confidence with the return to employees. Employees who decide to take responsibility for their work will first look if the organization gives their enough trust. Siemens on the one hand implements a liberal-oriented authorization management system in the middle and senior management; on the other hand a small organization that is directed by the program and group and is set up in line with global network, customer task and product traits among the staff. The organization pattern can not only solve the actual problems of the staff but also activate huge working enthusiasm. There is no doubt that in the book of “Siemens Communications” there is a saying that people are committed to simplifying the hierarchy and accordingly a kind of responsibility is brought. Hence, each person has a larger freedom to exert efforts to accomplish his or her task.
Open Thought Channel
Bill Pollard in his “soul of the enterprise” wrote: “Staff is not just ‘a pair of hands’, but a group who has thought and creative, they can take the initiative to change the various aspects of business”. Needless to say, the things which promote the development of productive forces most from the first line of the innovative minds; an organization’s decline are also beginning from the ideological rigidity of the employee. Thus, one of the tasks of modern organization is to activate the staff’s thinking, dynamic, open to speak up and build a career filled with imagination platform so that it will allow employees to be thoughtful practitioners (Liu, 2009, p. 1565). General Electric had been a long stick to imprisonment-style management and employees are expected only as “hard work, tight-lipped person”. Under Jack Welch’s initiative, GE proposed a bottom-up management style; its basic approach is as follows:
- To encourage staff share their insights in a collaborative corporate culture;
- To give front-line staff more responsibilities and greater rights;
- Eradication waste, unreasonable and repeated link of the procedure;
- To break the obstacles which the free exchange of ideas and results can exchange in the restricted area.
Let Employees take the Initiative Up
The traditional management pattern respect for authority and control of management and the concepts of modern management which require employees to take the initiative themselves. Elegant Poetry Kazuo Inamori who was known as “management of the St.” talked about the transparency of business law of Sony and indicated that the operators must be transparent, for example, how many goods they set in the current month, how much later than planned, how much the profit is, how to use the expenditure and so on. Even the employees in the bottom positions should be clearly aware of this. This will make the staff feel valued while it is also subjected to constraint the action of the middle and senior management personnel in transparent in order to initiate heart rooted in employee motivation (Broughton, 2010).
“Mobilized” means a passive, and “activeness” means a sense of responsibility. Seoul of the Republic of South Korea has a factory in order to train workers the sense of ownership and responsibility. From 1983 onwards, the introduction of a unique management system that the company allows workers to take turns each week as “one-day director.” Every Wednesday the specific employee who is the director of the week begins to work at 9:00 am to listen to a brief report from the various departments. Then, according to the problems reflected by each department the real director of the company proposes to first concentrate on solving one or two things. With questions the staff who works as the director of the company that day accompanied by the real director of the company goes too each workshop or each department to inspect work. The staff who works as the director of the company that day has the power of dealing with documents and makes up a detailed report of the day and puts forward advices for dealing with the serious problems of the day, and at last the one-day director passes around the contents. Hence, the staff’s thinking will go beyond the narrow mind which is only centred on his or her position, his or her eyesight is expanded, his or her awareness is stretched and his or her potentiality may also be expanded. Of course, there are other approaches such as the power-sharing, which allows the staff to have appropriate stock of the company and satisfies the belongingness of the staff and inspires the active sense of his or her inner heart.
Conclusion
The goals of the top-down organizational structure of a modern enterprise, the activeness of the bottom-up structure and the supervision of each department make the daily management more ordered. No matter which country and no matter which organization the communication and feedback of those two types of top-down and bottom-up are needed. The top-down control makes the company has a clear aim and direction. Hence, the paper introduces that with the changing of times the top-down management is also witnessing great change. The paper also lists a bunch of examples, such as the differences in the country’s political power. The paper also brings forward some advice for controlling the company.
References
Peter, Grundke, (2010). ‘Top-down approaches for integrated risk management: How accurate are they?’ European Journal of Operational Research. 203(3) p. 662.
Charles, Forelle, (2010). ‘EU’s Top-Down Crisis; Leadership Confusion Accompanies Obama’s Decision to Skip Talks’, Wall Street Journal (Online).
Andrew, McCormick, (2010). Labor picks supporter ideas for election push. P. 8.
Anonymous, (2009). ‘Research and Markets; European Administrative Law; Top Down and Bottom Up Contains the Proceedings of the Conference Held on 3 June 2009’, Business & Finance Week. p. 805.
Shaoying, Liu, (2009). ‘Integrating top-down and scenario-based methods for constructing software specifications.’ Information and Software Technology. 51(11) p. 1565.
Philip, Delves Broughton, (2010). ‘More than a Paycheck; Workers are more efficient, loyal and creative when they feel a sense of purpose-when work has meaning’ Wall Street Journal.