The Impact Of Management Style of Nagarta Radio On Reporters and Programmes Producers in the Station

QUALITIES OF GOOD MANAGERS

According to Ann E. Smith, there are many managers in the business world, but far fewer good ones. This is because either the managers are not competent for their roles, or they are completely self-absorbed and want all of the credit. Ann Smith identified the followings as the qualities of a good manager:

1. Leadership skills: Strong managers tend to have natural or well developed leadership skills. They know how to take charge without making others feel small. They know how to make critical decisions, and they know how to motivate their team members to deliver strong results.

These are some of the basic leadership skills and they are crucial for someone who wants to do a fine job managing others. Leaders tend to intuitively know when to pick battles and when to regroup. They are usually people of courage, and they display that in many ways.

1. Competence and talent: Strong managers should be highly competent in the functions they oversee, and they should also have talent. Those who are good at management need to know how to get the job done. Otherwise, they cannot advise others to accomplish what must be done.
2. Excellent relationship skills: Those who manage well tend to have excellent relationship skills. They are good with people, and they know how to get along with all kinds of personalities. The relationship skills are required not only to lead, but also to motivate their subordinates. Strong interpersonal skills are also critical for handling relationships with those in upper management as well as outside parties.
3. Openness: Good managers are open to the ideas of others. They may not always go along with them, but they are ready to listen and to find out what others think.

 

They also invite feedback from those who report to them. Instead of being threatened by such feedback, a quality manager recognizes that hearing such information is critical for continued success.

 

1. Mentoring role: A good manager looks to mentor those who report to him. He wants others to succeed, and actually cares about the development of his employees.

Instead of looking out for only himself, this kind of manager looks out the good of the team as well as of individuals who comprise it. He mentors others to be successful and sees this mentoring as a huge responsibility.

1. Ability to create industrial harmony: Industrial harmony is the ingredient of a productive enterprise. It is achievable when management takes the necessary steps to settle industrial disputes occasioned by the demand for wage increase, improved welfare package and good working condition. Since human wants are unlimited and resources are scarce, it is not possible for all these needs to be satisfied simultaneously.
2. Promotion of corporate social responsibility: The idea of corporate social responsibility stems from giving back to the host community some of the benefits derived from its operations. Initially, companies whose activities constitute threat to the environment are under obligation to undertake some philanthropic projects to assist communities who are badly affected by the company’s operations one way or the other. The philanthropy may take the form of building schools, hospital, boreholes, scholarships grant, employment opportunities etc. The concept of corporate social responsibility is meant to cultivate the goodwill and solidarity of the host community towards the company and to discourage all act of sabotage.

 

2.5      MANAGEMENT FUNCTIONS

James Higgins (1994) in his book “The Management Challenge”    identified planning, organizing, influencing or directing and controlling as the functions of management.

1. Planning: This is the on-going process of developing the business’s mission and objectives and determining how they will be accomplished. Through the planning process, many objectives may be identified which includes
2. Economic
3. Service: In broadcasting station, this means designing programmes that will appeal to the audiences and be responsive to their interests and needs. The station can also contribute to the well being of the community through its programming.
4. Organizing: Organising is the process whereby human and physical resources are arranged in a formal structure and responsibilities are assigned to specific units, positions and personnel’s. It permits the concentration and coordination of activities and management control of efforts to attain the stations objectives.

 

In a typical broadcasting station, organizing involves the division of work into specialties and the grouping of employees with specified responsibilities into departments. The following departments are found most frequently in commercial broadcast stations.

1. Sales department: The sales of time to advertisers is the principal source of revenue for commercial radio and television stations and is the responsibility of a sales department headed by a sales manager.
2. Programme department: Under the direction of a programme manager or director, the programme department plans, selects, schedules and monitor programmes. The department also provides relevant content for the station’s website.

• Promotion and marketing department: This function involves both programme and sales promotion. The former seeks to attract and maintain audiences, while the latter is aimed at attracting advertisers. Both functions may be the responsibility of a promotion and marketing department. Some stations assign programme promotion to the programme department and sales promotion to the sales department.

1. News department: In many stations, the information function is kept separate from the entertainment function and is supervised by a News director. The department is responsible for regular scheduled newscast, news and sports, documentary and public affairs programmes, and for website news content.
2. Production department: In radio, this department is headed by a production director or creative director and is charged with writing and producing commercials.
3. Engineering department: A chief engineer or technical manager heads this department. It selects, operates and maintains studio, control room, and transmitting equipment, and often oversees the station’s computers.

• Continuity: Continuity is concerned chiefly with the writing of commercial copy, and in many stations, constitutes a sub-department within the sales department. The continuity director supervises its work and reports to the sale manager. The general managers’ success in organizing rests heartily on the selection of employee.

 

1. Influencing or directing: The influencing or directing function of the management centres on the stimulation of employees to carry out their responsibilities with enthusiasm and effectiveness. It involves motivation, communication, training and personal influences
2. Motivation: For the General Manager, motivation is a practical issue, since the success of the station is tied closely to the degree to which employees are able to satisfy their needs. The greater their satisfaction, the more likely it is that they will contribute fully to the attainment of the station objectives

 

Basic needs include adequate compensation and fringe benefits programmes, safe and healthy working conditions, friendly colleagues and competent and fair supervision. The higher level of the needs of the employees must be satisfied through the following factors; job title and responsibility, praise and recognition for accomplishment, opportunities for promotion.

1. Communication: Communication is vital to the effective discharge of the management function. It is the means by which employees are made aware of the objectives and plans of the station and are encouraged to play a crucial role in the attainment of those plans and objectives.

• Training: Most employees are selected because they posses the background and skills necessary to carry out specific responsibilities. However, they may have to be trained in the use of new equipment or the application of new procedures.

1. Personal influences: Stimulating employees to produce their best efforts requires that the General Manager and others in managerial and supervisory positions command respect, loyalty and co-operation. Among the factors that contribute to such a climate is management competence, fairness in dealing with employees, willingness to listen to and act on employees’ observations and complaints, honestly, integrity, and similar personal characteristics.

 

1. Controlling: Through planning, the station establishes its objectives and plans for accomplishing them. The control process determines the degree to which objectives and plans are being realized by the station, departments, and employees. Periodic evaluation of individuals and departments allow the General Manager to compare actual performance to planned performance. Where they do not coincide, corrective action may be necessary. (Higgins)

 

• PRINCIPLES OF MANAGEMENT

Fayol (1965) developed a list of fourteen management principles to assist managers in carrying out the management functions. The principles are flexible and adaptable to changing circumstances. They are as follow:

1. Division of work: This means that specialization of work results in higher and better productivity.
2. Authority and responsibility: The right of the manager to give orders and to demand conformity, accompanied by appreciate responsibility.
3. Discipline: This means obedience and respect for agreements between the firm and its employees.
4. Unity of command: This means an employee should receive orders from only one superior.
5. Unity of direction: This means each group of activities should have same objectives.
6. Subordination of individual interest to general interests: This means the interest of one employee or group of employees should not prevail over that of the concern.
7. Remuneration of personnel: Payment should be fair and as far as possible, satisfaction to both employee and employee.
8. Centralization: This means that each firm must find the optimum degree of centralization to permit maximum utilization of employees’ abilities.
9. Scalar chain: The line of authority, from top to bottom, through which all communications pass.
10. Order: Material and employees in their appropriate places, to facilitate the smooth running of the business
11. Equity: This means kindness, fairness and justice in the treatment of employees.
12. Stability of tenure of personnel: Employees must be given time to get used to new work and succeed in doing it
13. Initiative/creativity: This means the freedom and power to think out and execute a plan.
14. Espirit de corps: This means establishing harmony and unity among the personnel.

• MODERN THEORIES OF MANAGEMENT

Carter McNamara noted that contemporary theories of management tend to account for and help interpret the rapidly changing nature of today’s organisational environments; the followings according Carter are some of the management theories.

 

1. Contingency theory: Basically, contingency theory asserts that when managers make a decision, they must take into account aspect of the current situation and act on those aspects that are key to the situation at hand. Basically, it is the approach that “it depends”.

 

For example, the continuing effort to identify the best leadership management style might now conclude that the best style depends on the situation.

 

Contingency theory was propounded by Follett in 1920s, but it was not until 1960s that it gained recognition and became a major force in management practice.

 

According to Follette, “there are different types of leadership” and that “different situations require different kinds of knowledge and the man possessing the knowledge demand by a certain situation tends in the best managed business, their things being equal, to become  the leader of the moment”.

 

Nagarta Radio had in the first quarter of 2010 adopted this type of management approach, when the then Managing Director of the station, Engineer Mohammed Bello Tunau was suspended and an interim manager appointed to respond to the deteriorating state of the organization. The new manager on assumption of office, introduced new interim measures, and put on hold several strategies of the former management.

 

1. System theory: System theory has had a significant effect on management science and understanding organisations.

 

System theory posits that an enterprise or broadcast station is a system having set of objectives with given set of relationship between the objects and their attributes connected or related to each other and to their environment in such a way to form a whole or entirety.

The system of an organisation composed of people, money, material, equipment and data, all of which are combined to achieve a given objective. The sub-systems are divisions or departments whose activities assist the larger system to reach its goals.

All organisational systems have the following elements: input, process, output and feeback. The inputs are labour, equipment and capital; the process is the method of converting input into output. System theory has brought a new perspective for managers to interpret patterns and events in the workplace. They recognize the various parts of the organisations, and in particular, the interrelations of the parts.

1. Chaos theory: As chaotic and random as world events seen today, they seem as chaotic in organisation too. Yet for decades, managers have acted on the basis that organisational events can always be controlled.

Chaos theory recognizes that events indeed are rarely controlled