The scope of farm management reveals that the study of farm management involves all aspects of human endeavor. There is no area of agricultural economics that is not relevant to farm management. The study of production, distribution, consumption, and exchange are all essential in the study of farm management. This article is devoted to the study of the principles of farm management.
Definition of Principles
A principle is a fundamental truth, the basis of reasoning, the primary element, or general law. The principles of farm management represent the fundamental laws on which farm management practices are built. Principles must be general in coverage and applicable to diverse sizes and compositions of farm enterprises. Farm management principles provide a foundation for effective practice.
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The General Principles of Management
The general principles of management must be distinguished from the methods or procedures for achieving the goals. They relate to the primary purpose of an enterprise, which is to provide goods and services desired by consumers, employing the most economical and convenient methods.
Principles of management are only guidelines that require great skill in using and adapting them to particular circumstances. Henri Fayol gave and elaborated fourteen (14) principles as follows:
1. Division of Work: Specialization, whether by workers or farm managers, is necessary to provide the required knowledge and expertise. Farm managers can train workers to specialize in various fields of agriculture.
2. Authority and Responsibility: Authority may be formal, based on position in the organizational hierarchy, or personal, resulting from personal characteristics. Ideally, it should be both. Responsibility must match authority. The purpose of authority is to direct activity in the right direction, and sanctions or punishments must be available to be applied to those who will not conform.
3. Discipline: This may arise from formal or unwritten agreements between management and workers as to what is proper conduct, or it may be imposed solely by management.
4. Unity of Command: Each worker must have one boss from whom he receives orders. Departmental responsibilities must be very carefully set out so that there are no overlapping authorities.
5. Unity of Direction: There can be only one head of the organization whose job is to see that all efforts are directed toward the same overall goals.
6. Subordination of Individual Interest to General Interest: At the individual level, the employer or manager must suppress personal interests at the workplace. In the case of sections and departments, group interests must also be subordinated to the common goal.
7. Remuneration of Personnel: Compensation must be fair and satisfy both the employer as a reasonable cost for services rendered and the employee as a means of livelihood and return for effort. Time rates, job rates, piecework, and bonus schemes are all admissible as appropriate.
8. Centralization: The degree of centralization would, however, vary according to circumstances and the abilities of the people concerned.
9. Scalar Chain: This is the line of authority from superior to subordinate, from the very top to the bottom of the business. In each aspect of the business, the chain must be unbroken i.e. at each level, a worker must have an immediate boss, who himself has a boss and so on up to the managing director. The scalar chain is the channel for authority to communicate and implement decisions.
10. Order: A place for everything and everything in its place. This applies to materials layout and human or social order. Social order needs a careful balance of requirements and resources.
11. Equity: Fairness, kindness, and justice to all must not only be done but be seen to be done.
12. Stability of Tenure of Personnel: As much as possible, a firm should provide a career structure so that its managers stay and progress within the firm. Outsiders may at times have to be brought in, but there must be a good reason for doing so.
13. Initiative: Encouragement of initiative promotes zeal and energy. Its use, however, must be within the limits of respect for authority and discipline.
14. Esprit de Corps: This is the last of the principles and one which must permeate all others. It is described as harmony among all members of the organization. The all-too-frequent management practice of divide and rule is roundly condemned.
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Basic Principles of Farm Management
All the general principles enumerated above are relevant to farm management and can easily be related to the basic principles given below:
1. Planning and Control: Planning and control are important tools in farm management. They provide the administrative aspect of management. The essential steps in planning and control involve setting goals and objectives, laying down responsibilities for specific sections, determining or setting appropriate standards of performance through systematic analysis and assessment of the relevant facts
Then ensuring effectiveness by continuously comparing achievements with the set goals. Work specialization, simplification, and standardization all help to make the routine effective.
2. Organization: Organization involves defining individual responsibilities as well as inter-relationships between sections. A large farm business establishment involving many enterprises requires subdivision into appropriate sections with specialized related functions. As the organization grows larger, the individual supervisor may become overloaded.
The need then arises for the delegation of part of the responsibilities to lower-level supervisors. Arrangement must be made to ensure effective coordination. There must be clear lines of responsibility linking the farm manager with various decision-making or execution centers; each supervisor must be responsible for a limited number of subordinates in inter-related activities.
Functional sections must be so integrated as to avoid impairing the clear lines of responsibility and command. Delegation of responsibility does not excuse the superior officer from being accountable for any shortcomings. No good farm manager will relax after delegating authority. At least occasional checks are carried out to pick up slackness or deviation from instructions.
3. Coordination: There must be specific responsibility for deliberate continuous coordination with laid-down procedures. While linking up various aspects of the enterprise, management must promote personal and social satisfaction of all workers within the establishment.
Group satisfaction must be sought over and above individual satisfaction and, since each individual has varying external influences, it is very difficult to attain this group satisfaction while completely satisfying each individual. Regular contact and exchange of ideas ensure that all concerned are in consonance with the management.
There is unified command and no one sees himself as a slave to a boss. The set of instructions is initially developed through consultation with various levels of operators, and it is best to allow people to understand why instructions are given.
A clear understanding of the impact of each person’s action or inaction will gear him up toward his responsibility. These instructions must follow clear lines of responsibility and the structural setting in the organization.
4. Motivation: The morale is kept high by keeping all workers informed about the activities, the successes, and the drawbacks, consulting them before new regulations are put forward, fostering the sense of responsibility, and allowing them to develop their own capabilities within the overall goals of the organization.
The farm manager must give workers room to contribute more than mere performance of their allotted routine duties. There must be security of the job and confidence that one is not simply being used. There must be fairness and objectivity in dealing with workers. Discipline must be maintained and accepted by subordinates.
When there is a sense of responsibility, there will be no need to gear people into action. Continuous review of codes of conduct helps to keep them in line and updated. The personality of the farm manager to a great extent determines the level of morale and discipline in the organization.
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