[Solution] Managers in Organizations
Created at:
Author: Sarah Bennett
Organizations can only achieve their goals by using their resources well. The people who are responsible for how well resources are used are the organization's managers.
Management of Resources Efficiency and Effectiveness
An organization is a group of people working together in a structured and coordinated way to achieve a set of goals. Management is the combining and coordinating of various resources to achieve the organization's goals. There are four types of resources:
- Human
- Financial
- Physical
- Information
For example, the management of a food delivery company's resources would include . . .
- Spending money (financial resources) to hire dispatchers and drivers (human resources).
- Tasking these employees to pick up supplies, such as delivery bags, from an office (physical resources).
- Collecting market research (information resources) about what customers are willing to pay and what competitors charge for similar delivery services.
Efficiency and Effectiveness
Managers use these four types of resources to achieve organizational goals. Managers seek to achieve the organization's goals in an efficient and effective manner.
- Being efficient means using resources in a cost-effective way. The food delivery company might have a driver deliver to several addresses in the same neighborhood.
- Being effective means making the right decisions and carrying them out successfully, such as by offering customers the types of food they want.
It's possible for an organization to be effective but not efficient, or efficient but not effective. Successful organizations are both.
Select the words that best complete the sentence.
Physical resources .
View Explanation
Physical resources are equipment, such as machinery, or buildings. Human resources are people who do work for the organization. Financial resources can be used to purchase things. Information resources are data.
Select the correct response to the following question.
When an organization is efficient, what is it doing?
- Engaging in activities that fulfill its mission
- Spending no more than needed to accomplish a task
View Explanation
Efficiency means using resources in a cost-effective way. An example of efficiency would be include lowering the cost per customer transaction or buying materials of the same quality at a lower cost.
An organization is effective when it accomplishes tasks which to fulfill its mission. An organization may be effective but not efficient if those tasks are accomplished at too high a cost.
