Report on Management and Operations at Marks and Spencer (M&S)

This report provides a comprehensive analysis of management and operations at Marks and Spencer (M&S). It begins with an introduction to the company, followed by a comparative evaluation of the roles and responsibilities of leaders and managers, supported by definitions and examples. The report then examines the application of different management and leadership theories, including situational, contingency, and systems leadership, to support growth and sustainable performance at M&S. It explores the impact of these theories on leadership quality and discusses the significance of key approaches to operations management. Furthermore, the report assesses the impact of external business environment factors on operational management decisions, analyzing how these factors affect the business environment and wider community. The report concludes with recommendations for future improvements, providing a detailed insight into the inter-relationship between employers, suppliers, workforce, and shareholders and their work culture at M&S, highlighting the importance of effective leadership and operational strategies for achieving business objectives.

MANAGEMENT
AND OPERATIONS

TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3
TASK 1 ...........................................................................................................................................3
Introduction..................................................................................................................................3
P1. Definitions with comparison between roles and responsibilities of leader and manager......3
P2. Examining roles of a leader and functions of a manager in different situations ..................5
P3. Applying different management and leadership theories to M&S for support growth and
sustainable performance ..............................................................................................................6
D1. Impact of theories on the quality of leadership ..................................................................10
Conclusion ................................................................................................................................10
TASK 2..........................................................................................................................................10
Introduction of operation management of M&S .......................................................................10
P4. Explain key approaches to operations management and role of M&S leaders and managers
in it ............................................................................................................................................11
P5. Importance and value of operations management in successful meeting of business
objectives ..................................................................................................................................13
P6. Assessment of the impact of external business environment factors on operational
management decisions by leaders and managers ......................................................................14
M4. Analyze how these factors affect the business environment and wider community..........15
D2. Critical evaluation on managing factors that impact on the wider business environment .15
Conclusion and recommendations for future improvements ....................................................15
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................15

REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................17

INTRODUCTION
Management in an organisation is considered as amalgamation of business strategies with
application of its functions. Leaders and managers play pivotal roles in execution of such
implementation of smooth running of policies and objectives. This report is based on
management and operations of Marks and Spencer (M&S). A comparative evaluation between
roles and responsibilities manager and leader by applying different theories will be included.
Significance of key approaches and its impact on the cited company will also be done. Overall, it
will lay an insight on the inter-relationship between employers, suppliers, workforce and
shareholders and their work culture at M&S.
TASK 1
Introduction
M&S has become a brand name in the retail sector, headquartered in Westminster city,
London. Currently, it deals in apparel selling, along with home products and luxury food
products. It follows a flat structure where this simple and efficient arrangement will bring an
intact operative execution of decision-making that result in day-to-day accountability of running
of business.
P1. Definitions with comparison between roles and responsibilities of leader and manager
Roles Leader Manager
DEFINITION
Leader can be refereed as the
one who follows a consistent
pattern to influence group of
people in several ways for
finding out solutions for
overall effectiveness.
Manager is the one who can
accelerate initiation with
foresightedness, and self-
confidence with a touch of
personal integrity.

Information role
Leader sets a clear vision for
making employees
understandable and motivated
for participating in
organizational activities.
Manager acts as the
spokesperson for M&S and
must monitor as well as
disseminate all their
employees.

Decision-making
Leader must integrate by
linking M&S goals with
personal growth of an
employee by applying proper
execution (Arruda, 2016).
Can be considered as a
negotiator with an ability to
utilize and allocate M&S
resources in appropriate
manner.
Interpersonal role
Good communication skills
with passionate commitment
towards M&S vision will
help in inspiring and creating
innovative ideas among their
employees.
Directing and influencing sub-
ordinates by conceiving goals
and organizing training for the
same. Along with,
maintaining discipline and
establishing contacts is done
by M&S manager.
Characteristics Leader Manager
Confidence
M&S leaders are confident
and liable for all the
decisions made for earning
profits. They concentrate
on people, especially
stakeholders through trust,
consistency and loyalty by
delivering their promise on
time.
Manager must be confident
as dealing with the entire
management as they
emphasis on analytical
structure for fulfilment of
objectives and goals.
Guidance
Leader influences
employees by making
them realise about
competency and resisting
any temptations.
Leader assigns tasks in
various M&S departments
like designing, manufacturing,
retailing etc. by directing and
managing all the operational
activities (Gao and You,
2015).
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Risk-taking
They are known of initiating
designing of new ventures
that sometimes lead to failure
(McArthur, 2015).They work
regularly to remain
optimistic.
They control the
occurrence or minimising
of risks; mostly, avoidance
is the key. Their aim is
based on shorter-term
goals.
SIMILARITIES
 They both are responsible for building a functional structure of an organization.
 They both are goal oriented.
 Both deals with people, especially employees and stakeholders.
 They have an ability to mold the structure of company’s environment to achieve
objectives.
There has been significant effects of modern and classical concepts and theories of
management on M&S. Fayol and Taylor gave complementary perspectives. As per Fayol,
hierarchical structure from MD towards bottom-line should be followed whereas Taylor laid
prominence on operative level which works on bottom to top managerial order
Functions of Manager: They can lay attention on Fayol’s universal theory of
administration for development of organisational structure. Managers actually command,
coordinate and control.
Role of Leadership: In this aspect, leaders can use Taylor concept so that overall
productivity gets enhanced and minimize wastages. Along with, engineering thinking from
classical management theorists saw leaders to plan and organize.
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P2. Examining roles of a leader and functions of a manager in different situations
M&S is one of the major leading organizations but sometimes, there is confusion and
negativity amongst people, which makes it difficult to maintain harmony and discipline at
workplace.
Cultural workforce indifferences: There is always a struggle faced by companies like M&S to
blend multiple personalities in a united and organized team due to its expansion in many
countries like Singapore, India, USA etc.
Role of a leader: He must organize weekly meetings, outings and conduct various
activities to engage their employees by giving them a chance to interact with each other. This
will create a healthy engagement and also awareness might be improved regarding policies and
regulation of M&S.
Function of a manager: He must lay a plan to make them work in a controlled
atmosphere where coordination and support will be needed to enhance team work.
Strengths:They both together bring a holistic viewpoint to gain insights and maintain the
ambiance of the business environment in effective manner. This would accelerate the growth of
M&S in leaps and bounds.
Weaknesses:Sometimes, manager's orientation of work approaches do not get aligned with
leader's styles and this act as a hindrance. The approaches used by both of them are different but
deals with the same purpose of profitability.
To sum up, leaders have inherited capabilities whereas manager with time, gains the
important traits for sustainable components. Thus, they must together work for establishment of
success, profitability and increased productivity.
Poor communication and feedback: A transparent and clear message delivery is a must work
in an amiable and productive environment which includes interaction between manager and team
leaders, leader and its group members, store manager and customers etc.
Role of a leader: He can bring changes by encouraging innovation in communication
channels at M&S to gain more customers. An honest and constructive feedback will assist in
improvements (Cook and Billig, 2017). Along with, employees might get confused initially so an
open dialogue with the top management about team mates will avoid performance gaps and raise
their productivity.
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Function of a manager: Training is essential for continuous improvement in terms of
personal growth of M&S employees so that execution of tasks can be done smoothly and without
any hindrances. Any sort of retaliation, misbehavior or mis-happening can be avoided by
formulating strategies to effectively launch product or service with the help of tools and
techniques for marketing.
Strengths:Both manager and leader must be good at the interpersonal skills. Moreover, they
should know how to influence people and mould them with employing any manipulative moves
or tactics to make the employees' work in appropriate manner with adoption and practice of good
negotiation skills.
Weaknesses:The operational approaches followed by both of them for the completion of
assignments, jobs and tasks can sometimes pave the path of miscommunication, opaqueness and
lack of understanding. Henceforth, this creates an atmosphere of unfriendly ambiance that also
have adverse effects on the working practices and is not good for the professional setup which
stands on discipline and code of conduct.
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P3. Applying different management and leadership theories to M&S for support growth and
sustainable performance
Situational Leadership Theory
It defines as that style where the leader or manager adjust their own personality and
ethics to fit into the company’s structure so that they are able to influence employees. This model
includes four basic behaviors such as S-1 Telling, S-2 Selling, S-3 Participating and S-4
Delegating
M&S can accomplish their objectives by quantifying the above specified scales. Telling
infers unidirectional flow of information from M&S leader to members of group for proper
channel to sustain their performance. Selling of emotional support and cooperation must be
propagated amongst team members for maintaining an amiable environment. Participating leads
to provision of decision making in a team that result in a democratic system, giving an
opportunity to work in desired way. Lastly, delegating reflects on distributing responsibilities
amongst group members to complete tasks on time with viability.
Figure 1: Situational theory
(Source: Halpern, 2016)
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Contingency Leadership Theory
It defined as effectiveness of leadership depends on situational factors like personality,
nature of the task and others. Here, the leader should be able to demarcate between use of style
with respect to occurrence of situation.
M&S can implement this in the following manner:
Positional Power: It is an index of how much authority is needed to impact the M&S
sub-ordinates working environment for their sustainability of performance; if they report directly
to their leaders, then this positional power will be strong enough to lead a reward matrix at
M&S’s to withstand the hardships for better work culture.
Relationship of Leader-members: This is the measurement of acceptance between
organizational leaders and employees of M&S (Maylor and et.al., 2018). They have international
sourcing offices in different countries and in need of strict policies with flexible working culture
for overall enhancement in presentation and success rate.
Structure of task: This gives transparency regarding tasks and its overall execution while
opening a new M&S outlet or section in its old stores. Overall, progress of a project can be
amplified on the basis of provided guidelines for sustainability at M&S office.
Systems Leadership Theory
This is defined as that style of leadership where people will be encouraged to work to
their full potential by building suitable conditions at all levels. This approach gives an insight on
the dynamism of the environment with complicated framework in creating such concepts.
M&S uses this theory for improving their employees’ sustainability in terms of
performance. They can impart training and development programs with respect to different
departmental requirements and generalized form of basic corporate cultural mannerisms. This
company generates higher revenue and increase productivity that might amplify complexity,
intricacies and uncontrollable events in the entire managerial structural formation so a suitable
methodology or approach must be employed at M&S. This company is based on creative aspects
but for this, an understanding of paradox with ambiguity would be needed; so M&S could bring
rapid alternations for an objectivity while dealing with their consumers’ mind-set.
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Strengths Weaknesses
Situational
Leadership Theory
 Simple and easy to
implement.
 Focuses on
competency and
maturity of all
members in a team,
which sometimes
might get overlooked.
 Time consuming and
complexity in
structure formation of
assignment/tasks.
 Not applicable to
administration or
management as they
have limited role
access.
Contingency
Leadership Theory
 Application has been
tested with extensive
empirical studies.
 Well defined and
predictive model to
analyze on both
situations and LPC.
 It could not provide
reasons for
effectiveness in
various situations.
 LPC is contentious as
assessment done on
employees failed to
justify the leadership
style.
System Leadership
Theory
 Emphasis on
individual as well as
organizational goals
 Support employees to
get accustomed with
the work culture at
M&S.
 Time consuming
process
 Low effectiveness
while conducting
operations and making
decisions difficult for
leaders and managers
of M&S.
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