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 Managerial MBS Basic Estimate For The Total Quality

I've always been concerned about the career of the manager, president or whatever you want to call that executive that at a given moment of his life is doomed to lead or manage a particular company. When I finished my university studies, I obtained a precious diploma that in a way it said: "The Universidad Pontificia Bolivariana considering that Mr. Luis Guillermo Jaramillo Mejia coursed and approved all subjects corresponding to the curriculum of Chemical Engineering, we conferred the title of Chemical Engineer ..."

This particular legend issued by a respected university had a basic meaning: It empowered me to act as a chemical engineer, that's it! But (here's the science) and Where could I practice? Where could I perform? .... In any chemical engineering company, of course, so if i were a novice, a neophyte. I was just a chemical engineer; I had completed a specialized curriculum, recognized, consistent with those of the most reputable Western schools, which simply allowed me to introduce myself as Chemical Engineer. The key: A curriculum, some subjects, a course, some tests and the proficiency that accredited me such a professional. 

Will it be the same with the Business Manager? Is there any University that awards the degree of Manager or President? Could something like that be though of? What type of professional should be required in order to run a company? What type of professional can you entrust this delicate mission? This is the question that I’ve been asking myself for the past twenty years while I was practicing "another profession " in several branches or specialties.  

The conclusion I`ve reached after a passive observation, is the following that type of professional is not made at any university and that the Manager or President career is only made through the University of life, but under certain rules or conditions and "studying certain type of subjects." What actually happens for example with the military professionals with the Generals? No military school in the world graduate Generals or commanders. Officials graduate, who continue their career and their studies, and some day they will receive the General grade. But never before a demanding training, a continuous education and a successful career!  

My concern about administration was born from observing and from the systematic study of the challenges faced in a generic way in almost all of our companies, beginning with the diversity of styles and different trials that had to be put up with at a management level. Because its` not a secret for anybody that today we speak of managerial styles and that management is an art. Even today certain tools or subjects of the Administration are confused with itself when it comes to strategic planning, Administration by objectives, organizational development, systems theory, contingency, and so on. 

All this leads me to conclude that at this point, in a doctrine level a standard, concerted and unisonous judgment doesn`t exist, focusing on the real essence and structure of the administration as a career and profession which should be, and that in my opinion is crucial in order to ensure an integrated development and a successful leadership for any company.   This conclusion, which goes against many theories and proposals of what an manager should be, is based on the convergence or the common denominator provided by the majority, if not to say the high number of companies at a primitive or basic level of their resources. I refer to primitive because they are common to all companies; they are the generators, or the ones that give origin to other subsidiary resources because without them or lacking only one of them, it is not possible to structure any company in an objective or material sense. These resources are the human beings, money and time (HDT), resources like the CHON elements that support life on our planet make the company a tangible reality and alive.   While all businesses are born from competition, combination, interaction, work, relations, and coordination of those three fundamental resources and in order to direct, coordinate, and make them produce and achieve objectives, a "manager" is needed. This special professional is a leader with the ability to fully respond for the performance and control of those resources.  

MBS Origins

Normally the abbreviation of MBA stands for: Master in Business & Administration, a postgraduate course in administration in an expertise level that is taught in reputed administration universities. But in our case, based on the analysis made to the problems faced, are facing and will face our companies, for sure we will find that the majority are facing a partial or total ignorance in some specific basic subjects. These subjects are: Personal Affairs, Science and Technology, Planning and Operations, Integral Control, Communications and Public Relations, and we decided to call them the Manager´s Basic Subjects. Luckily a manager must have a "MBS Diploma " or  it will not be able to be called like that, in the same way, like a chemical engineer completed a specialized curriculum in Chemical Engineering, a lawyer in  jurisprudence and a doctor an specialization in medicine .

The proper Administration of those resources requires a full knowledge and mastery of the five Basic subjects and this is based on the following reasons: 

  1. The manager must ensure an integral development of his employees. Additionally It is his responsibility to achieve the same motivation for all and strive for excellence in their performance. 

    In this conception, all sciences related to personnel management, selection programs, training, organizational structure, human development, labor wellbeing, involvement of the people in the company, motivation and understanding are important chapters in this matter, Personnel Matters. We have observed in several companies and as an exception, the personnel programs and the staff attention programs are in fashion, as if these resources appeared recently. In most companies there are personnel departments, to manage conflicts and control rule and regulations procedures. Even more, I don`t think i am exaggerating because  most of a these offices are second level and production or marketing and sales departments are much more important from all points of view. Big mistake, because the other resources time and money don`t mean anything by themselves, if behind them there isn`t people, in other words Human Talent. Managers have been born "technical", mostly aimed in looking for a quantitative and economic solution they are more "economists" than anything else and they forget the human talent, as a fundamental and essential part of the company, its the resource that Moves the company. 

  2. The manager must master his job and know with perfection the scientific and technological action field in which his company, Department or section moves.  The area under his responsibility must be fully imbibed and solid of the latest technics for its correct guidance and leadership. 

  3. The manager has an inexorable resource which is time and once it’s lost, it can´t be recovered.  Every Job must be planned and executed in a precise and consequent manner.  A manager should always ask himself: Whatis going to be done!, How is it going to be done!,Why is it going to be done!. Planning is just a basic subject an essential tool. An administration without it is not conceived, now planning must be linked to the operation. First is planning and second is operations. Is not possible to understand a planning without and operation and this one without the other.

  4. The manager must control all his operations. An integral control of each activity leads to a total quality in the job. All things must be done right from scratch. The final quality of a particular product must not be controlled. Every job or activity must be executed with quality for this reason the supervision and control of each activity in each step or stage is a must.

  5. The manager is an individual that permanently works interrelated with other people, The interpersonal relations are determinant and irreplaceable. Due to this, his character, comprehension and knowledge in public relations and communication are basic. An explicit sign for the manager might not be anything to his colleagues or coworkers, if these have not had the possibility of interchanging ideas or knowledge in that information. 

Each one of these subjects are basic and a mismatch in only one of them, will alter the whole system and it won`t produce the expected results

A manager directs, manages and controls resources, Human Talent, time and money and for this he must know, master at least these subjects and what they mean, in other words, he must be a "A professional with a degree" in MBS in order to have the capacity to respond for any company whichever it is. 

I could go on forever with the examples of specialized companies in which the manager must always have a Diploma in MBS. Today perhaps the world's largest company, the most complex under creation, is the recovery of Kuwait and the expulsion of the Iraq invader. I think no one can doubt of the magnitude of such company or human resources. Money in possible human lives, values, in principles and in global impact. From the success or setback in this operation depends the future of the world. Well, leading the recovery forces there is a true professional, a manager, a four-star general holding an MBS degree. Its stars are the result of his career, his knowledge and success. It could not be replaced by a skilled person or a politician or a lawyer, No!, his position can only be replaced by another similar or better manager than him, but with the same structure, knowledge and methods, with the same scheme! They couldn`t appoint a manager for this company, a graduate from the School of Art and Decoration or from the New Yorker Institute of Photography. 

With the company is the same. If the resources managed are basically the same, we could expect to succeed in its guidance, if every time we have a different style manager? What if the pilots of a 767 that Avianca just put in its fleet and that cost sixty million dollars decided to fly everyday with a different style, sometimes inverted, and other times with the engines off? No, the administration can not be of styles, its a systematic and scientific profession and who doesn`t hold a "MBS Diploma" will not be able to lead his business with success and permanence. He could have lucid moments or of luck, or maybe shine in times of plenty but when you have to face real difficulties and challenges you will not prevail. Total Quality is an old concept and new, it parts of a philosophy, a budget, from an elemental base but consistent, unison or uniform of a language, and mainly this is the concept of the Managerial MBS, the rest will be only a trend, a show, a program, which necessarily will go to the drawers of the scouts or skilled that don`t know how to absorb the refinement that the practice of Managerial MBS requires.

 

L.G. JARAMILLO
Medellin, UdeM Magazine No. 57 Oct 1990

 

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