Leadership and Management Roles, Theories, Approaches: M&S Report

This report provides a comprehensive analysis of leadership and management, exploring the distinct roles and characteristics of leaders and managers within the context of Marks & Spencer (M&S). It differentiates managerial functions, such as planning, organizing, and controlling, from the leadership role of inspiring and guiding toward organizational goals. The report delves into various leadership theories, including situational, systems, and contingency leadership, evaluating their strengths and weaknesses and their application within M&S. Furthermore, it examines key approaches to operations management, emphasizing the roles of managers and leaders in streamlining business activities. The report also addresses the impact of environmental factors on decision-making and operational management within the company, including conflict resolution and decision-making processes. The report concludes with a review of the key concepts and their practical implications for M&S, highlighting the importance of effective leadership and management in achieving organizational success and sustainability.

MANAGEMENT
AND OPERATIONS

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
TASK 1............................................................................................................................................1
P1 Define and compare roles and characteristics of leaders and managers...........................1
TASK 2............................................................................................................................................3
P2. Different situation of organisation with role of leaders and functions of managers........3
P3 Different theories of leadership and models of approaches..............................................4
TASK 3............................................................................................................................................6
P4 Key approaches to operations management with role of managers and leaders...............6
P5 Importance of operational management............................................................................8
TASK 4............................................................................................................................................9
P6 Impact of environmental factors of business on decision making and operational
management............................................................................................................................9
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................11
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................12

INTRODUCTION
Operational management refers to a process of planning, organising and supervising
functions of a company. It works with a purpose to make necessary improvement in business
operations are carried out so that higher profitability can be attained. It is considered as
multidisciplinary functional area within an organisation, which makes sure that resources like
materials and labours are perfectly utilised. The present assignment is made to differentiate roles
of leaders and functions of managers in a company in different-different situation. For this
purpose, M&S is undertaken which is an multinational company has near about 979 stores
which offers its products like branded clothes, households and food items worldwide. This report
demonstrated effectiveness of theories of leadership and management. Moreover, some factors of
business which put adverse impact on decision-making process and operational activities also
highlighted.
TASK 1
P1 Define and compare roles and characteristics of leaders and managers
Marks & Spencer Group Plc is a British multinational company of UK. It is
headquartered in the City of Westminster, London which specialises in offering a wide range of
branded products related to clothes, food and households items. It was founded in 1884 by
Michael Marks and Thomas Spencer in UK. Around 979 stores of M&S are running at
marketplace of UK and in many countries where 85,000 employees are currently working. These
workers give high commitment in order to bring innovation and sustainability of business at
marketplace. Since every business runs with a specific purpose therefore, main objective of
M&S is 'to gain high profitability and maintain long-term sustainability'. For this purpose, its
employers seeks to include a wide range of products in food sector like ready meal or partly pre-
prepared items. It will help in gaining attention and retention of loyal customers.
As organisational structure of a company depends upon size of business therefore, Marks
& Spencer follows a flat mega structure (Strande and Brdjanovic, 2014). It includes a limited
level of management between administration staff and front-line employees. Therefore, it aids
employees to feel equally and share their ideas in developing and enhancing performance of
business.
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Managers are those persons in a company who take entire responsibilities to manage
functions of a company. It includes planning, organisation, control and coordination. They have
authority to hire or fire employees in order to improve performance of an enterprise.In context
with leaders, they influence subordinates in order to achieve a specific goal. They shares vision
and inspire others to conduct a task in appropriate manner so that higher profitability of business
can be gained. Functions of managers is to prepare plans, policies and strategies by concerning
on requirement of business. While role of leaders is to set directions through which such plans
can be implemented in proper way and obtain desired outcome.
Comparison on different roles of Leaders and functions of managers:-
Basis for Comparison Leaders Managers
Roles Leaders work with main
purpose i.e. to lead a group
towards goals and objectives
of a company (Morschett,
Schramm-Klein and Zentes,
2015).
On the other hand, managers
manage entire activities of
organisation like hiring or
firing employees at workplace,
provide training program for
enhancing skills and more, by
which goals and objectives of
business can be achieved in
desired manner.
Characteristic Leaders are honest in their
work and use proper
communication techniques to
influence people around them.
Whereas characteristics of
managers are different from
leaders as they work on the
basis of commitment, creativity
and versatility.
Focus They concern more on
developing level of trust
among team-members so that
all work in cooperative
manner.
While managers focus on how
to control and manage system
so that targets are fulfilled
rather than constructing trust
and loyalty between staff-
members.
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Risk In order to introduce creativity,
leaders take risk and influence
team-members accordingly.
Instead of this, managers
minimise risks rather than to
initiate for profitability of
business.
TASK 2
P2. Different situation of organisation with role of leaders and functions of managers
As M&S operate its business at large scale and serve products in worldwide. Therefore,
to fulfil requirement of each customer belong to different-different backgrounds is not an easy
process. It rise to generate various issues and problems in operation management. It includes
decision making activities, employee engagement, upgrading system, interpersonal conflicts and
more. These issues lead to put an adverse affect on performance and productivity of workplace.
Therefore, role of leaders and functions of managers can be differentiated on the basis of
handling such issues. For example: Managing Employee- Work-related pressure generate high
degree of stress among workers and staff members. In this case, leaders first identify at which
work leaders feel unable to work alone and then engage them in group-related activities. It will
help in reducing excessive workload of employees (Fayol, 2016). On the other hand, managers
provide reward to best performers so that others can motivated to work well. Similarly, some
other situations of M&S where leaders and managers play different role can be demonstrated in
following manner:-
Situation 1: Conflicts Resolution
Conflicts are considered as main issue which mostly occurs in those companies which
has large working organisation and presence of diversified employees. In context with M&S, it
has various stores where workers belong to different background. Therefore, due to different
perceptions, occurrence of clashes between them is natural but it adversely affect whole working
organisation also. Managerial functions: In order to handle this situation, managers of M&S engage
workers in group related activities as well as allot roles and responsibilities according to
their skills. This activity help in developing relationship among staff members by which
they can share different opinion and ideas with each other.
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 Leaders' role: To minimise occurrence of conflicts, leaders identify skills and abilities of
each employee. After then organise training and development program so that skills gap
between workers can be reduced. It helps in generating feeling of equality in employees
and they will cooperate each other for completing a task.
Situation 2: Decision-making Process
Decision making process is an important function of company but due to lack of proper
communication, fear of failure and more, arise problems in conducting operational and other
activities in appropriate manner. With respect to M&S, problem related to determine whether
modification in operational system is necessary or not arise generally. Managerial functions: For dealing with such situation, managers of M&S, analyse
functions of each area and determine where changes are necessary to be done. After then
they enrol workers in decision-making activities to inform them requirement of
modifications and get feedback on necessity of the same (Peng and et.al., 2015). It will
help in getting support of employees in taking proper decisions.
 Leaders' role: On the other hand, to resolve mentioned issues, leaders share vision and
provide specific guideline to workers. They convince employees to adopt new techniques
and work accordingly.
P3 Different theories of leadership and models of approaches
A knowledge of different type of leadership and management theories, help a firm in
hiring right candidates at workplace and get their contribution in achievement of business goals.
It helps in improving performance of business as well as handling various issues appropriately.
In context with M&S, choosing a best leadership style assist in taking up company on next level.
It includes situational, trait, contingency and many more leadership which has own benefits and
drawbacks. All these theories help managers of M&S in resolving issues which arise while
conducting operational activities in business. A brief explanation on how such theories help in
sustainable performance and growth of business is stated below:-
Situational leadership theory: As per perception of Webb, (2017) the fundamental
principle of this theory is that there is no best style of leadership. It is based on type of task
which assist leaders to adopt leadership style as per ability and willingness of group whom they
have to lead. For example: In M&S, leadership style of managers vary with type of tasks,
functions and job role that they need to be accomplished. In case of having proper skills and
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abilities of workers but yet to be demotivated for a task, then in such condition, managers
involve them in decision making activities. It help in boosting morale of employees and
motivating them to do a task in appropriate manner.
Systems leadership theory: According to opinion of Giuliani, M (2015), this approach
of leadership identifies the inter-relations or inter-dependencies of different parts of
organisations. It generally focuses on changes which may impact on environment of a company.
For example: M&S use this theory for measuring performance and developing interaction
between departments. For this process, it organises meetings and some conferences on regular
basis where managers of all departments discuss about how process going on and what changes
are necessary to be done. It helps in attainment of growth and development of business.
Contingency Leadership theory: As per views of (Parisio, Rikos and Glielmo, 2016).
contingency theory states that there is no perfect style of leadership, it only depends upon current
situation of workplace and some contingent factors It includes power of leaders to influence,
expectation of workers, certainty or uncertainty of task and last but not least is complexity of
organisation. For example: Managers of M&S mostly use this theory for engaging employees in
group related activities. It will help in developing good relations among workers for employee
engagement and motivate them to give high commitment towards achievement of business
success.
Major strengths and weaknesses of different theories of leadership
Leadership Theory Advantage Disadvantage
Situational This theory is simple to
understand and allows
individuals to change style of
leadership as per situation
within business organisation.
Situational leadership theory is
not effective for task-oriented
managers as shifting process
may keep them away from
long term goals.
Systems It enhances adaptability of
organisation for environmental
changes in business.
Therefore, using this system,
managers of M&S can take
This theory leads to delay in
decision-making process.
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decision as per micro and
macro environment of
organisation.
Contingency Using this theory of
leadership, M&S can become
able to assess better and tailor
management to meet specific
need of organisation.
Due to some limitations of
contingency theory, it fails to
prove more effective than
others. It includes complexity,
difficult empirical testing,
reactive but not proactive etc.
TASK 3
P4 Key approaches to operations management with role of managers and leaders
Operation management refers to main function of an organisation which helps in running
business activities effectively and efficiently. In this regard, operational managers are
responsible for streamlining and monitoring all functions professionally. Moreover, they must
ensure that processes are analysed and developed as per requirement of business. Therefore,
operation department seems as centre of organisation which oversees performance of overall
setup at workplace (Parisio, Rikos and Glielmo, 2016). With respect to M&S, using six sigma
and JIT management approaches, helps this firm in serving best quality of products or services
worldwide. It sells branded clothes, household items by labelling them with company's
trademark. In order to give tough competition to TESCO and H&M, it also offers luxurious
eatable like party-food, savoury and semi-baked items etc. Therefore, in making production more
effective and manufacture products on low cost, key approaches of operational management like
Just-in-time, six sigma and TQM help in reducing risk and cost of production. For this purpose,
importance of these key approaches can be explained in following manner: -
Just-in-time:It refers to inventory management which is also known as lean
manufacturing system. This strategy is used to increase efficiency of manufacturing process and
managing inventories. Therefore, M&S use it to manage inventories at warehouses and stores in
appropriate manner. As, it helps in reducing storage space by making products available only at
the time of demand.
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(Source: Process of Just-In-Time approach, 2018) Role of Managers:In JIT approach, main functions of managers of M&S is to ensure that
there is flexibility in production and this firm can meet rise in product demand.
 Role of leaders: In M&S, leaders play main role in ensuring that any type of delay by
suppliers may not put adverse effect on working system of company.
Six Sigma: This approach helps in improving and developing quality of operational
management by minimising errors and defects in products. So, M&S use this approach to reduce
cost and time of production. Six sigma consist DMAIC tool which creates a step for each
production process. It includes Define, Measure, Analyse, Improve and Control by which M&S
can produce best quality of products. The main beneficial aspect of this approach is that it helps
in reducing variance in outcomes. To improve system performance, it uses data and statistical
methods where a company collects information related to customer's feedback. Therefore, M&S
use roadmap of six sigma in following manner:-
Define: Under this process, managers of M&S are needed to identify area where problem
is persisting. They should determine cause behind customer's complaint and dissatisfaction.
Measure: In this regard, they have to prepare a proper questionnaire and ask some
respondents to fill it as per their perceptions. Further gather whole data and arrange in proper
manner.
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I
llustration 1: Process of Just-In-Time approach

Analyse: Through gathered information, managers need to take different statistical
methods for analysing, interpreting and drawing desired conclusion.
Improve: At this stage, they are required to determine in what manner improvement can
be done production so that high satisfaction of customers can be gained.
Control: It is last phase, where managers must monitor and control the whole process of
operational activities. This would help in increasing efficiencies of production process and helps
in getting positive response of customers as well. Role of Managers: In six sigma approach, managers have to make sure that
characteristics of product are designed as exactly as per requirement of customers. Role of leaders: In M&S, by giving high commitment of support on executive level,
leaders help in implementing this system in appropriate manner.
Total Quality Management: It refers to best approach which focuses on developing and
controlling quality of products. It can be defined as management philosophy which integrate
entire function of organisation like marketing, customer service, finance and production in order
to meet requirement of consumers. So, purpose behind using this approach by M&S is to meet
objectives of organisation and fulfil demand of customers in short-period of interval. Role of Managers: Under this technique, managers prepare plan and review all process
of integrating so that mentioned purpose can accomplish.
 Role of Leaders: They measure performance of each employee and provide training to
them. It helps in obtaining best work from employees for serving right quality of products
to customers.
P5 Importance of operational management
Operation management is an important function of an enterprise which involves various
activities like organising, managing, planning, supervising and controlling the entire process of
production. In this context, managers take responsibility to utilise resources in proper manner
while turning raw materials into finished products. It includes man, material, labour, machinery
and capital. Therefore, behind success of M&S, operation management plays a vital role As it
ensures that optimum utilisation of resources leads to enormous profit of this company. Thus, for
this purpose, operational managers control entire operation and if goods are produced catering to
requirement of people then, they will be delivered at a rapid rate. In order to increase efficiency
and improve overall productivity of business, operation management handles all issues of
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production like design and maintenance of the system. Since main aim of M&S is to gain high
profitability and maintain sustainability of business at marketplace. Therefore, to accomplish this
objective operational management gives support to employers to integrate efforts of employees
and utilisation of resources in providing best services to customers. Along with this, by
implementing management approaches like six sigma, help this firm in increasing efficiencies of
production process and satisfying demand of customers on time. Similarly, using JIT and TQM
approaches, M&S can maintain stocks and inventories at store in proper manner and ensure
quality of products as well.
Role of managers in operational management:
To meet business objectives of M&S, managers of operation department plays a crucial
role. They take responsibility to improve productivity and increase growth of organisation by
designing product exactly as customers need. For increasing efficiency of operations and
functions like manufacturing, purchasing, packaging, shipping and more, managers upgrade
entire system. Along with this, they provide essential training to workers also for developing
their skills and abilities. By this process, support of employees in increasing efficiencies and
effectiveness of business can be achieved.
Role of leaders in operational management:
In developing effectiveness of operational management, leaders of M&S also play an
important role. They improve communication process at workplace for increasing productivity of
business as well. As when information transferred from one person to another, or one department
to other in the clear and constructive manner then, it will speed up the pace on which business
can operate. For this purpose, leaders set up proper communication system like computer
accounting system. This system helps in calculating current inventories and send information to
production department for maintaining product levels. It aids to fulfil order of customers on time.
TASK 4
P6 Impact of environmental factors of business on decision making and operational management
When operations of an organisation are proper managed then entire functions of
departments run smoothly. For example- If operational managers formulate effective strategies
and policies which entails others in what manner they have to perform then it will help in
conducting functions more appropriately. Therefore, M&S concern more on implementing
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effective operational management at workplace which helps in successfully turn semi-finished
products into finished one and deliver them on time at marketplace. But there are various
external factors present at business environment which creates a large impact on decision-
making activities and operational management in following manner: -
Governmental Policies: Legal factor of business environment puts an adverse impact on
decision-making activities of all small and large companies. According to Kerzner and Kerzner,
(2017) regulatory bodies of every country set some rules and frameworks which are to be
complied by a company in order to run business smoothly. It includes economic policies, legal
changes and more. For example: A rise in taxation will increase cost of products so, it impacts
positively on profitability of business like M&S. Similarly, rise in interest rate raise costs to
companies of lending money so, it leads to fall sales also. Therefore, it creates negative impact
on operational activities of M&S and managers has to change decision-making strategies
according to governmental policies.
Technology: As per opinion of J. B. and Kim, (2015). innovation has become life of
business today, which create life-cycle of products much short at marketplace. Therefore,
changes in technology also impact on decision-making activities and operational management of
a company. For Example- In context with M&S, by adoption of latest technologies like digital
techniques, this firm has increased its customers base. Through Instagram, Facebook and online
facilities, marketing managers of this company develop good interaction with customers of
distant place and serve them products accordingly (Lee and et.al., 2014). So, it puts a positive
impact on profitability of this company. But for this purpose, M&S has to invest more on
upgrading system and organise training for employees also. So, it will negatively impact on
financial budget of company.
Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR): This factor of business environment puts a
large impact on decision making activities of a company. As if an enterprise creates investment
in CSR activities then it will enhance brand image of business at marketplace. As per opinion of
to Johnstone (2016), concerning on welfare of societies and environment and doing business
activities accordingly will create a positive image of a company at marketplace. For example:
Due to fluctuations in economy, M&S sometime not in condition to conduct CSR activities such
as carbon neutrality, reuse and recycle of waste products in appropriate manner. So, it put
negative impact on image of this company at marketplace.
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So, it has recommended to this firm to prepare effective budget plan so that in case of
economical fluctuation, managers can conduct CSR activities in appropriate manner. Along with
this, it should develop policies and strategies as per governance. All these processes, help this
company in reducing negative impact of external factors on operational and decision making
activities.
CONCLUSION
From this report, it has been summarised that without proper management of operations,
a company cannot achieve success in desired manner. Therefore, it is necessary for all
organisations to implement effective operational management system at workplace. It will help
in making available all resources like machineries, capital, labour and raw materials within
organisation. Along with this, operational managers control all major activities and integrate
efforts of employees in converting raw materials into finished products. In this era, managers and
leaders give support companies in increasing efficiencies of operational management by handle
all problems in specific way.
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Importance of operational management. 2017. [online]. Available through:
<https://www.mitsde.com/Blog/importance-of-operations-management/>.
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