The benefits of increasing womens participation in top management Essay

The benefits of increasing womens participation in top management teams - Essay Example However, more importantly, there is the question of the reasons as to why women are still assuming relatively fewer of these critical positions in corporations. Despite the fact that women account for about 33.3 percent of the players occupying managerial positions, in general, the 2007 survey by the bureau of labor statistics gave surprising statistics (Bureau of labor Statistics, 2007). The statistics include that, from the statistics of 2006, less than a third of the top one thousand and five hundred firms in American had one woman player as a top managerial executive. Further, less than 6 percent of the top firms reported having more than one woman in executive position, and less than 3 percent had a female CEO (Bureau of labor Statistics, 2007). Through this paper, the writer will review the arguments reported through different sources that women are better at executive management than their male counterparts, which will amplify the question of the huge gender gap (Castanias and Helfat, 2001). Through the review of the subject, and reviewing the factual nature of the information showing that women make better executive managers, recommendations will be offered – which are expected to improve the management of different firms and organizations. These aims will be realized through the essay, through reviewing available data, to verify whether the more effective executive managerial capacities can be verified – which will lead to the formulation of recommendations to remedy the situation (Deszo and Ross, 2008). Through the recommendations advanced, the executive managerial staffs of firms and organizations will seek to exploit the varied managerial outlook of male and female executives, which is anticipated to improve the performance of these organizations (Castanias and Helfat, 2001). This paper will cover a literature review, which will give account of sources supporting the excellent managerial outlook of female players, and then offer a case study of an organization that has benefited from female participation in managerial practices. Precisely, the paper will use the case study to support the information supporting the standpoint of the discussion, while at the same time integrating theory into the discussion, towards the formulation of informative inferences and conclusions (Deszo and Ross, 2008). Theoretical background Castanias and Helfat (2001) argue that there is a wide range of literature and research reports giving the information that female managers are not only as good at performance as their male counterparts, but are also more effective in the executive management of organizations. The arguments go ahead to discuss that woman executive managers tend to be less hierarchical in their management of organizations, and their managerial outlook is often found to be more interactive, which increases the engagement and the output of employees (Carter, Simkins and Gar, 2003). Apart from increasing the possible effe ct of increasing the productivity of the organization, the role of executive female managers is likely to increase the levels of teamwork realized across the organization, and is likely to increase the intrinsic motivation of employees – and the two lead to an increase in the creativity of the workers of the organization, at their different roles (Book, 2000). Eisenhardt, Kahwajy and Bourgeois (1997) support the same point of view that having female members in the executive managerial function is likely to improve the performance and the outcomes of an organization. They discuss that female participat

Value of IT to Richer Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Value of IT to Richer - Essay Example It is important to mention that large firm considers information technology to have strategic value and is used for attaining or realizing long term strategies of firms. The case of Richter also reflects the same. The aim to privatize the organization was realized through the implementation of the SAP financial module of an enterprise wide system. The success of the strategy to privatize the organization depended largely on the accuracy of financial information collected. The decision to implement SAP depicts the true value of IT that Richter held in realizing its long term goal to privatize. One of the strategic objectives of Richter was to increase revenues and reduce costs of the company. This required greater focus on materials management and production planning processes. It is seen that the major large organizations are able to increase efficiencies of their production processes and materials management processes through the implementation of IT infrastructure. Similarly, the i nstallation of MM module or the materials management module and the PP module or the production planning module was intended to bring about efficiency enhancement and productivity improvement in the organization. This was complimented with the establishment of a decision support system consisting of two production experts through whom doubts could be clarified, regarding data, definitions, procedures or information retrieval. The role of IT in improving revenues and costs also shows its value in Richter in meeting long term goals. Although installing the two production modules involved a cost of $2.12 million which comprised of an investment of $775,000 in equipments and $1.35 million on labour expenses. However, the employment of the internal IT staff saved the organization an amount of $525,000. Governance styles in use at Richter The case of Richter reflects the use of value based style of IT governance. The operational approach to IT governance describes governance as being inte ntional activity having its own artifacts and lifestyles. The value based IT governance style is based on the approach that desired outcomes can only be achieved through value based decisions. It tries to reject unnecessary activities and focuses more on high value projects. The value based style of IT governance begins from Richter’s decision making process regarding all the governance issues with beginning of the strategic plan of the company (CGI, â€Å"CGI’s approach to driving business value within managed services engagements†). The plan was aimed to involve all IT specialists within the organization as well as the IT mangers. The plan was primarily meant to focus on how IT could provide support to the business processes in the pharmaceutical company by stipulating the maintenance projects, investments along with changes in the staffing requirements and IT infrastructures. The IT governance includes the four stages of planning, implementing, managing and a ssessing. The planning stage necessarily involves identifying the governance requirement needs such as the meeting of compliance needs, adherence to policies, enhancing business values and meeting the service levels. The planning process in Richter begins with communication with the IT leaders about the infrastructural issues in the forthcoming