Functions of Management: Planning, Organising, Staffing, Directing, Controlling
What this domain tests
The five functions and their internal sequence, with enough detail to distinguish neighbouring terms such as delegation and decentralisation, or recruitment and selection.
Core concepts
- Planning: deciding in advance what to do, how and when. Types: strategic (long-term, top level), tactical (departmental), operational (daily). Plans fail when they lack flexibility or are not communicated.
- Organising: dividing work, grouping activities into departments, assigning authority and responsibility, and setting the span of control. Delegation is authority plus responsibility plus accountability from a superior to a subordinate; decentralisation spreads decision-making across the organisation.
- Staffing: manpower planning, recruitment (attracting candidates), selection (choosing), placement, training, appraisal, compensation.
- Directing: supervision, motivation, leadership and communication to get people to work willingly.
- Controlling: setting standards, measuring performance, comparing against standards, and taking corrective action. Control is linked to planning - plans supply the standards. Types: feed-forward, concurrent and feedback control.
- Coordination is not a separate function but the essence running through all five.
Worked example
Ravi opens a photocopy shop near a college. Planning: target 300 copies a day at ₹2. Organising: one counter for copies, one for binding; hire two operators. Staffing: advertise locally, interview three, select one with machine experience. Directing: demonstrate double-sided copying and set a daily target with a small incentive. Controlling: compare actual 240 copies against the 300 standard; find the queue forms at 11 a.m.; add a second machine at that hour. Reasoning: each step follows the previous one, and control feeds back into revised planning.
Traps that cost marks
- Treating staffing as only recruitment; selection, training and appraisal belong there too.
- Calling coordination the sixth function instead of the essence of management.
- Confusing delegation (to a person) with decentralisation (to a level or unit).