Skills of an Effective
Administrator (Robert L. Katz, Harvard
Business School Press, 1993)
Although the selection and training of good administrators is widely recognized as one of American industry's most pressing problems, there is surprisingly little agreement among executives or educators on what makes a good administrator. The executive development programs of some of the nation's leading corporations and colleges reflect a tremendous variation in objectives.
This quest for the executive stereotype has become so intense that many companies, in concentrating on certain specific traits or qualities, stand in danger of losing sight of their real concern: what a man can accomplish.
It is the purpose of this article to suggest what may be a more useful approach to the selection and development of administrators. This approach is based not on what good executives are (their innate traits and characteristics), but rather on what they do (the kind of skills which they exhibit in carrying out their jobs effectively). As used here, a skill implies an ability which can be developed, not necessarily inborn and which is manifested in performance, not merely in potential. So the principal criterion of skillfulness must be effective action under varying conditions.
THREE SKILL APPROACH
It is assumed here that an administrator is one who (a) directs the activities of other persons and (b) undertakes the responsibility for achieving certain objectives through these efforts. Within this definition, successful administrators appears to rest on three basic skills, which we call technical, human and conceptual.
As used here, technical skill implies an understanding of, and proficiency in, a specific kind of activity, particularly involving methods, process, procedures or techniques. It is relatively easy to for us to visualize the technical skill of the surgeon, the musician, the accountant or the engineer when each is performing his/her own special function. Technical skill involves special knowledge, analytical ability within that specialty and facility in the use of the tools and techniques of the specific discipline.
Of the three skills described in this article, technical skill is perhaps the most familiar because it is the most concrete and because of our age of specialization, it is the skill required of the greatest number of people. Most of our vocational and on-the-job training programs are largely concerned with developing this specialized technical skill.
As used here, human skill is the executive's ability to work effectively as a group member and to build cooperative effort within the team he leads. As technical skill is primarily concerned with working with "things" (process or physical objects), human skill is primarily concerned with working with people. This skill is demonstrated in the way the individual perceives (and recognizes the perception of) his superiors, equals, subordinates and the way he/she behaves subsequently.
The person with highly developed
human skill is aware of his/her own attitudes, assumptions and
beliefs about other individuals and groups, and they are able to see the usefulness and limitations of these feelings. By accepting the existence of viewpoints, perceptions and beliefs which are different from their own, they are skilled in understanding what others really mean by their words and behavior. This administrator is equally skillful in communicating with others in their own contexts.
Such a person works to create an atmosphere of approval and security in which subordinates feel free to express themselves without fear of censure or ridicule, by encouraging them to participate in the planning and carrying out of those things each directly affect them. He/she is sufficiently sensitive to the needs and motivations of others in his/her organization so the he/she can judge the possible reactions and outcomes of various courses of action he/she may undertake. Having this sensitivity, he/she is able and willing to act in a way which takes these perceptions by others in to account.
Real skill in worki