Coordination and Controlling
What this domain tests
Coordination as the essence of management and controlling as a process. Questions test the control cycle, types of control and the planning-control link.
Core rules
- Coordination is integrating the activities of different departments to achieve common goals; it is continuous and all-pervasive.
- Control process: set standards, measure actual performance, compare against standards, analyse deviations and take corrective action.
- Types: feedforward (before), concurrent (during) and feedback (after). Techniques include budgets, ratio analysis, break-even analysis, MIS and audits.
- Control and planning are linked: plans provide standards, and control verifies them. Control is not punishment; it is forward-looking correction.
Worked example
Standard output is 100 units a day; actual output is 80. Deviation = -20%. Before blaming workers, check causes: machine breakdown, material delay or an unrealistic standard. If the standard was set without capacity data, revise the plan; if a machine failed, schedule maintenance. The reasoning must reach the corrective step.
Traps that cost marks
- Saying control is only post-action; feedforward and concurrent control also exist.
- Treating coordination as a separate department or function.
- Skipping the comparison step and jumping to punishment.
- Forgetting that control without planning has no standards.