Management Operations Report: Leader, Manager Roles and Theories

This report delves into the realm of management operations, focusing on the distinct roles and characteristics of managers and leaders within an organization. The report begins by comparing managers and leaders, highlighting their similarities and differences, and then examines the functions of a manager, including planning, organizing, controlling, commanding, and coordinating, within the context of Marks and Spencer. The report proceeds to explore various leadership theories, such as situational and contingency theories, and their application in addressing organizational challenges. Furthermore, the report investigates key approaches to operation management, including just-in-time and total quality management, and their significance in enhancing product quality and customer satisfaction. The importance and values of operation management are also discussed, emphasizing its role in product positioning, resource optimization, and customer satisfaction. Finally, the report analyzes the impact of business environment factors, such as political, economic, social, and technological factors, on operational management and decision-making within a retail setting.

Management Operations

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
TASK 1............................................................................................................................................1
P1 Comparison of different roles and characteristics of manager and leader.............................1
TASK 2............................................................................................................................................2
P2 Role of leader and functions of a manager according to different situational context..........2
P3 Various leadership theories....................................................................................................3
TASK 3............................................................................................................................................4
P4 Key approaches of operation management ...........................................................................4
P5 Importance and values of operation management.................................................................5
TASK 4............................................................................................................................................6
P6 Impact of business environment factors upon operational management...............................6
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................7
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................8

INTRODUCTION
Management operation refers to monitoring various activities in an organisation for
achieving business objectives. It is done by the top level management of the company which
controls and guide employees according to requirement of the customers. Marks and Spencer is
one among the top retailers in UK. This report includes brief description of various roles and
characteristics of a leader and manager (Jacobs, Chase and Lummus, 2014). Apart from this,
major function of manager and its importance in organisational growth is elaborated in the
following study.
TASK 1
P1 Comparison of different roles and characteristics of manager and leader.
Marks and Spencer is a multinational retail organisation which offers its services
worldwide. This organisation offers home products, food items, apparel in its stores. It was
founded by Michael Marks and Thomas Spencer in 1884. Currently, Marks and Spencer have
approx. 979 stores in UK. It is responsibility of top management to control and monitor all the
activities within the organisation in order to achieve their goal and objectives.
Manager: Manager is the individual whose major responsibility is to manage group of
people or team for specific task.
Leader: Leader refers to individual who have ability to influence people to achieve his
goals. Leaders own the dominating personality and have excessive knowledge of his stream.
Similarity between manager and employees: Manager and employees both plays
essential role in the organisation which is beneficial for organisational success. Both of them
have to formulate various strategies in order to achieve business objective. Leader and manager
of Marks and Spencer are using new technologies to improve the quality of the products and
increases its brand recognition among the world.
Comparison of roles of manger and leader.
Manager Leader
 Major role of manager is to take
appropriate decision according to
various situations (Hugos, 2018).
 Leader supports the organisation in
taking effective decision which is
beneficial for the business growth.
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 Another role of manager is to follow
rules and regulation of top
management.
 Manager have to transfer the changes
done by top management in norms and
policies of organisation towards
employees.
 They follow their own thoughts and
ideas to get success.
 The main role of leader is to
communicate with their team members
and about company mission and vision.
By this leader can easily formulate
effective strategies to attain set goals
and objectives.
Comparison of characteristics of manger and leader
Manager Leader
 They communicate less to the team
members which shows less
interpersonal skills.
 They works according to the guidelines
of top management gives more priority
to the provided details.
 Leaders own effective interpersonal
skills which helps them in connecting
to its employees (He, Li and Chai,
2014).
 They are highly innovative and works
according to ideas and thoughts.
TASK 2
P2 Role of leader and functions of a manager according to different situational context
Every organisation is working for the motive of business growth. For this, manager have
to perform various functions such as planning, organising, controlling, commanding and
coordinating in order to achieve predetermined goals and objective. Manager of Marks and
Spencer formulates effective planning to implement new technology in the organisation which
will improve the skills of the employees and helps them in performing their work in effective
manner (Haimes, 2015). This will maximise benefit and enhance its brand value. In context to
Marks and Spencer these functions of manager are evaluated as below:
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Planning: In this, manager of Marks and Spencer have to evaluate future conditions and
formulate effective strategies to achieve objective of organisation. Proper planning is required
by this organisation to secure themselves from upcoming problems which may affect business.
Organising: Manager of Marks and Spencer should organise its staff member, business
activities and structure in appropriate manner for success.
Commanding: It is required by the manager to supervise employees on daily basis for
improving their performance.
Coordinating: Manager of Marks and Spencer must coordinate with the subordinate in
their operational work as it will improve workflow, productivity and also motivate employees
(Grahn, Johansson and McKelvey, 2014). Communication is the best way coordination.
Controlling: It is the responsibility of manager to control unnecessary activities in the
organisation. For this manager of Marks and Spencer observe employee’s activities and conveys
actual requirement of organisation.
Apart from this, decision making is the another function of the manager which helps the
organisation in it business growth. In relation with Marks and Spencer, its manager both plays
essential role in effective manner for business growth and benefit.
Role of leader: Leaders have better interpersonal skill which helps him to influence the
employee in order to accept the technology. Leader of Marks and Spencer also motivates its
employees to perform effectively for achieving goals in the given time period. Another role of
leader is to formulate appropriate strategies in the organisation to overcome the upcoming
situation. These strategies also guides the employees in achieving their goals and objective on
time.
P3 Various leadership theories
Leadership is considered as the capability of the leader to influence its follower for
accomplishing the task in effective manner. There are various approaches which are used the
leaders to deal the problems or situation and also motivates team members to accomplish their
business activity in effective manner. Various leadership theories used by leader are evaluated as
below:
Situational theory: This theory emphasize on the quality of good leader. According to
this theory, a good leader is the one who can change management style as the situation
(Leadership Styles 2018).
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This theory is adopted by the leaders to fulfil the requirement of the customers by transforming
their working pattern on the basis of situation. Situational leader follows following elements: Communicate: A good situational leader communicate with it is team member to
convince them about the change and also takes suggestion from them to deal with the
situation in effective manner. Diagnosis: Situational leader diagnose the whole situation in order to understand and
find out the alteration accordingly.
Contingency theory: In this theory, leader and manager both focuses on designing
flexible policies and system in the organisation which can be further changed as per the market
scenario. In relation to Marks and Spencer, its manager formulates the policies and strategies
with the Changing time. For example: Manager of Marks and Spencer can conduct several
training program in the organisation in order to develop the skills of the employees.
Systematic leadership theory: This approach explains that a leader must consider
company as an interconnected system of various divisions which interact with one another to
form a whole organisation so that company can achieve organisational goal. By using this theory
M&S can bring coordination among its functional units which help in improving efficiency.
TASK 3
P4 Key approaches of operation management
Operation management is considered as the controlling and redesigning of production
process according to the needs of customers requirement. Marks and Spencer uses several
approaches to develop their products according to the customer which will also increasing the
profitability of firm.
Just in time: In this approach, manager of Marks and Spencer focuses on reducing
unnecessary activities (Evangelopoulos, 2016). To implement this strategy in organisation, its
manager have started ordering raw material at the time of requirement which have directly
reduced inventory cost.
Total quality management: This approach of operation management emphasize on
improving overall quality of the organisation on the basis of products, culture, process and
services. In context to Marks and Spencer, its manager can opt this approach to improve the
quality of products that will increase customer satisfaction.
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Role of retail manager:
Store manager is accountable to organisation for improving satisfaction level of
customers as well as the sales. There are various functions of store manager of Marks and
Spencer are described below:
Store operation: It is the responsibility of retail store manager of Marks and Spencer to
monitor all operational activities within the store. This involves security, assurance of cleanliness
and staffing. In this, store manger of this firm develops various strategies to minimize expenses
by reducing the wasteful activities in the store (Christopher, 2016).
Recruitment and selection: It is essential function of retail manger as it provides right
employee to store. Employees are hired according to the skills and their abilities which meets
with stores requirement and leads to improve sales of Marks and Spencer products.
P5 Importance and values of operation management
Operation management is the essential in every organisation as it improves the quality of
the products for increasing customer satisfaction level. Other importance of operation
management is evaluated as below: Product positioning: Operational management is essential for product positioning of
products of Marks and Spencer. This organisation uses operation management to deliver
quality products and services to its customers which enhances their satisfaction level. As
a result it will increase the sales and maximise profitability to the company. Minimising wastage of resources: Operations management is important in the
organisation as it reduces the wasteful activities in the organisation. It also guides
employees to use resource in effective manner for accomplishing business goals. Marks
and Spencer is using just in time approach for deducting wasteful activities in trhe
organisation. Supports in satisfying customers needs: Marks and Spencer uses operations management
to satisfy the needs and requirement of the customers. For this, its manager is
concentrating on manufacturing high quality products which satisfies the needs of the
customers and also increases their satisfaction level.
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 Inventory management: Operations management also supports in managing the stock or
inventory within the store (Balasubramaniam and et. al., 2016). Manager of Marks and
Spencer is using total quality management and just in time approach to control the
inventory. These approaches helps in reducing unnecessary activities in organisation.
TASK 4
P6 Impact of business environment factors upon operational management
Business environment is the combination of various internal as well as external factors
which affect the organisation and its growth. These factors also affects operation management.
Various external factors which affects the operation management of Marks and Spencer are
evaluated as below:
Political factors: These factors involves various policies formed by government which
affects the business in positive or negative manner within the trading country. Increase in trading
policies of the trading country will directly increase the costing of the product and affects the
sales of Marks and Spencer.
Economic factors: These factors involves taxation policies, inflation, recession,
economic growth pattern of the country. Here recession in UK will decline purchasing power of
the customer and affects the profitability of Marks and Spencer as its products are expensive.
Social factors: Social factors is considered as the belief, culture and attitude of the
customer which affect the business operations and growth of the organisation (Jacobs, Chase and
Lummus, 2014). Change in the trend of trading country will impact the Marks and Spencer as its
difficult for this organisation to monitor and analyse taste and preferences of the customers from
different nation.
Technological factors: Usage of advance technology in the promotion of Marks and
Spencer will be beneficial for the long term growth. It will be helpful for the manager of Marks
and Spencer to monitor and control activities of employees across the world.
Impact of factors on decision making of store manager
It is essential for the store manager of Marks and Spencer to evaluate external
environment to identify the availability of the opportunities at marketplace. After analysing all
the factors it will be convenient for the store manager to take proper decision on time. Store
manager of this organisation can understand needs and requirement of the customers in effective
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manner which will guide organisation to manufacture products accordingly. This will increase
the customer satisfaction and also support the company in taking taking advantage of
competitiveness. These factors will also guide store manager to find out the threat and take
decision for overcoming them.
CONCLUSION
From the above mention report it has been concluded that management operations is the
activity which controls the unnecessary activities which increases the profitability of the
organisation. It also increases the customer satisfaction level by providing high quality products
and services to them. Several roles and characteristics of manager and a leader with their
differentiation is elaborated. In addition to this, various approaches of operations management
are include in the given report.
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REFERENCES
Books and Journals
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system. U.S. Patent 9,077,611.
Evangelopoulos, V. A. and et. al., 2016. Optimal operation of smart distribution networks: A
review of models, methods and future research. Electric Power Systems Research. 140.
pp.95-106.
Grahn, M., Johansson, K. and McKelvey, T., 2014. Model-based diesel Engine Management
System optimization for transient engine operation. Control Engineering Practice. 29.
pp.103-114.
Haimes, Y. Y., 2015. Risk modeling, assessment, and management. John Wiley & Sons.
He, J., Li, K. and Chai, X., Huawei Technologies Co Ltd, 2014. Method for executing
management operation by communication terminal and a terminal and system thereof.
U.S. Patent 8,700,757.
Hugos, M. H., 2018. Essentials of supply chain management. John Wiley & Sons.
Jacobs, F. R., Chase, R. B. and Lummus, R. R., 2014. Operations and supply chain management
(pp. 533-535). New York, NY: McGraw-Hill/Irwin.
Marchington, M. and et. al., 2016. Human resource management at work. Kogan Page
Publishers.
Narayanaswami, C., Raghunath, M. T. and Rosu, M. C., Institute for Information Tech
Advancement and International Business Machines Corp, 2016. Context-aware code
provisioning for mobile devices. U.S. Patent 9,418,367.
Online
Leadership Styles. 2018. [Online]. Available
through<https://www.verywellmind.com/leadership-styles-2795312>./
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