Isn't it true that the monkey dances only for silver?
In 1911 Taylor surprised the world with his theories embodied in a book on economic man: "principles of scientific management" (man lives by bread), a great discovery. Charles Chaplin magnifies it in his style in the film: »Modern Times". But.. Isn't it true that the monkey dances for silver?
There is an evolution of the concept of the individual in the field of administration. This goes hand in hand with the discovery or creation of new concepts on How to treat people in an organization?, that with the passing of time have been appearing.
revolution-in-human-resourcesTo show a button
Let's use the parallelism with the evolution of the media, more directly with radio.
Example: the radio
1.-Vacuum tubes = tubes
Electronics in its beginnings, was based on the use of systems made up of vacuum tubes. (An electronic circuit covered with a glass film of considerable dimensions). The end result was a product of significant size, but that served its purpose: to communicate.
2.-The Transistor
It is said that the transistor was invented in General Electric but, for reasons of "managerial myopia," it ended up being used by Bell (1948). This discovery reduced the enormous size of radios to a more manageable and easily portable model. Without forgetting the objective of radio: to communicate .
3.-Chips: integrated circuit
The human being is a very intelligent being. If you do not find obstacles in your way you can give a lot of yourself. The new discovery, the Chip, made existing electrical appliances on the market obsolete (something similar to cell phones of the 80s).
This discovery allowed complete circuit boards to be replaced by small cards (they could be the size of a palm of the hand), which allowed the same, and with better performance: to communicate.
4.-Microchips
However, things do not stop there. Microchips make things smaller. What used to fit in the palm of a hand is now becoming smaller and better performing than a chip. (Remember that before it was impossible to carry a radio in your shirt pocket). Well now the radio fits not only in your shirt pocket but you can even find it as an additional component of a common pen (they say it plays songs in mp3 format. Mp3 what is that?)
5.- Nano tech
It is in the evolution of Nanotechnology. An increasingly impossible in the process of reduction and improvement of electronic circuits. This, for example, allows a transmitter to be installed in a living being (less than 0.5 millimeters in size, human hair is larger), which allows its geographical location through the use of the satellite system (For example, the United States can be found in pets and in some cases in underage children, to respond in the event that they are lost).
And the man
But what similarity does that have to the management of the human factor?
Much. What you must realize is the way in which the criteria and ideas change in the face of the same objective, that is, the way to achieve the desired result will depend on the means that are available at a certain time, influenced by assumptions by the environment, some they could say circumstances. Well, human society is a society that learns… from its mistakes.
To better understand the concept, let's analyze the conceptions about the nature of individuals that have motivated various theoretical currents and especially doctrines in the world of administration.
What the "man" was thought to be
Different conceptions about the nature of individuals
1.- The economic man
Individuals seek to maximize their own interests. Financial incentives are the only motivating element of the individual Organizations control economic rewards and therefore the behavior of the individual.
Frederick W. Taylor
Human feelings are irrational and therefore must be controlled to prevent them from becoming dysfunctional. There is no self-control of the person.
Doctrines such as Taylor's and Mc Gregor's theory X are examples of these ideas.
Here the functions of people management fall into the Personnel department (personnel administration), its task was to control the workforce: attendance, absenteeism, performance, discipline. These are some of its activities
Incidentally, you can find them today, for example in micro-businesses in Peru. If you don't want to go too far, analyze How does a micro-entrepreneur manage his staff?
2.- The social man
Man is motivated fundamentally by social needs and it is relationships that give him the opportunity to satisfy his needs.
The behavior of the individual responds, more than to economic stimuli, to the forces of the group.
Then, the control under the guidelines of the "economic man" begins to get out of "control" with the social changes of the time and the need arises to hire specialists who handle more technical criteria of a legal nature and even of a social order. The strength of the group or the informal.
This is where Industrial Relations (the company's lawyer) and Social Service (support for the worker's family problems) make their appearance, two apparently opposite concepts but which at heart represent the beliefs of the moment: Keep it calm, but do not neglect the discipline.
3.- Man realizes himself
The individual seeks to be able to display in his work the capacities that he possesses and that in some way, are limited as a result of the high degree of specialization of his tasks.
The existence of needs of a lower order (elementary) up to those of self-realization is recognized.
The individual wants a certain degree of autonomy in his activity.
This autonomy makes the theorists of the moment begin to spread concepts such as: competencies, incompetencies, personnel development, strategic management.
It is recognized that people are the purpose and the reason for being of the organization.
After all, without people there is no machine or system that works. The search for the parameters that make an individual competent in their activities is then outlined.
The company's management plan is associated (for the first time) with the work plan of the human resources area (Strategic planning?). The truth is that planning has always been carried out, only now the person in charge of human resources is called to participate in its preparation and execution in what concerns him.
In a video about companies, the strategic planning manager of a local bank stated: “Capital can be raised, infrastructure can be built, systems can be created in some way or another. But it is the people who make each of these elements work… "
4.- The complex man
The human being has a dynamic character, this indicates the degree of evolution that can hardly be explained with a theory.
There is no issue
It has been shown that only by knowing what you want and what you can do can achieve excellent results for the organization. Thus, the concept of strategic management of the human factor arises. From resource to capital and from capital to factor (such as time).
It uses concepts of a military nature (strategy).
It studies what the company can do good, bad, worse and terrible (they call it: »SWOT»). The result is applied to the human factor before starting the strategic management and the human resources area is in charge of enhancing the capacities of the personnel in search of obtaining the ideal resources that allow us to achieve the objectives set through the chosen strategies (example: hire new staff, have a salary scale higher than the market, train certain areas of the company, etc.)
And does it all end there?
No, as in the initial parallelism.
Already in the field perhaps of espionage, where you can place a transmitter on the neighbor's telephone to listen, record and sometimes film what he does (suck they call him).
There is a case in which an organization used a "medium" (a person with extra sensory abilities) to learn the competitor's secrets (imagination, science fiction, no, check with the armed forces of your country).
In the concept of the individual, it is also undergoing changes. They talk about: »appreciative dialogues Saud,» emotional intelligence »(A brain with emotions?),« Intelligent organizations »(we continue with intelligence),« Coaching »(she is not a coach of any soccer team, always clarifying),. »Knowledge management izard, etc, etc….
Some are academic fads (there always are), others are administrative currents (some difficult to verify, but with a bulletproof logical framework, (if not, remember hygienic theory).
The truth is that human management in the organization continues to change and will continue to do so because human beings will always discover things or have ideas that they had not previously imagined or seen, considered, evaluated and even "marketed".
An example: Do you know what human benchmarking is?
No, research maybe when you finish reading this article you are already out of date. And this "work" will consequently have to have a second chapter.
An interesting thought:
The reasonable man (they say) adapts to the world. The unreasonable man tries to adapt the world to himself.
In this way…. Progress depends on the unreasonable man
George Bernard Shaw
So seek to be as unreasonably a person as possible.
Who knows, maybe it's another Goleman, Maslow or Herzberg?
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