Finance and Business

Organizing the Marketing Function

Some managements fall into a trap by trying to adopt the organization plan of another company. It is perfectly natural to look at company A, observse that it has been succesful, and conclude, therefore, that its form of organization, applied to our company, will make us succesful. Such a conclusion usually is incorrect.

Even when the products and markets were similar, the personnel, management attitudes, history, size, and the company`s image in the market place were different. And some cases the products, markets, channels of distribution, and needs of customers were different.

This is not to say that one management cannot learn and get ideas from the organization plans of other companies. Of course it can and should. In the cases cited earlier, each company has retained some aspects of the plan it tried to copy. But to try to adapt another company`s organization plan to one`s own company without first thinking through what it needed for success will almost surely result in lost time, money, effort, and  people. One of the greatest contributions experienced management consultants can make is in the area of organization planning.

Some companies have made serious mistakes even with this type of help, but qualified management consultants have worked with many types of organization, and they know the steps of analysis that must be gone through to device a sound organizational structure.

Business management is sometimes accused of following fads. Once a new management technique is adopted by a few companies and receives some acclaim, many others rush to join in, often without sufficient thought as to whether, or how, it applied to them. This has been true with decentralized management and with divisionalization. It is certainly true  of the marketing concept. Market orientation is so sound in its basic concept that most managements have accepted the idea. However, many have tried to adopt it by making changes in their organizations without firt examining the needs of their markets, the strenghts and weaknesses if their company, and the type of personnel available for staffing positions calling for new skills and responsibilities.

Internal and External Relationships of Manager

All business today is so much under th influence of government regulations that the marketing manager must keep well informed on the laws and administrative practices affecting the marketing of his company`s products and services. Furthermore, through personal effort and through cooperation with industry associations, he must do his part to prevent laws and regulations that place unwise and unwarranted restictions on the free marketing system.

On the other hand, the marketing manager must converse his time carefully. It is very easy for an outgoing type of executive to become so involved in contact with costumers or with association activities that he can not spend adequate time on his major internal responsibilities. Although a statement of relationships will not prevent unwise planning, the marketing manager will find it valueable to consider how much of his time he should devote to external activities. Which one are essential and which non-essential.

The need for a new Type of executive

It is apparent that the type of executive needed to fill the top spot in the marketing department is an individual very different from the one who run the sales department a few years ago. The scope of his job has changed from one of obtaining maximum sales volume for the company`s products to one of producing optimum profitable sales volume today and planning for tomorrow`s profitable growth. This change has accompanied other changes in business organization and pratice, including the setting up of separate research, development, and engineering departments.

In the chapters that follow we shall examine further what type of qualification he must posses. We shall look at his organization, the people he stuff it with, his planning procedures, his supervisions, measurements, and controls. We shall find out how he utilizes marketing research, how he plans for products to fill market needs, and how he advertises and sell for maximum profitable income. Finally, we shall learn how he develop himself and his managers, and we shall look into the crystal ball to see what the future may hold for the marketing manager of tomorrow.

Markering, indeed, is vital key to corporate profits in todays business environtment. How well marketing managers adapt the techniques developed bu our most successful and forward-looking companies will determine to a large extend the future profitability of their own companies.

Internal Relationships of Manager

The relationship of marketing manager is report to the president or, if he is marketing manager for a division, to the division manager. It should be clear by now that the type of marketing manager we are discussing must report to the chief decision maker, whether his tittle be chairman, president, or general manager. At no lower level can be possibly have the authority and status needed to carry out his job, nor at  a lower level can he look for the coordination with other functional areas of the business that must be provided by the chief executive.

We have shown the marketing manager supervising the general sales manager, advertising manager, marketing research manager, product manager and marketing service manager. The position supervised vary, of course, with the type of company and the organization required to serve best the needs of the company`s costumers. A listing of internal relationships helps to point out the other executives in the company with whom the marketing manager must deal in order to carry out his job.

A statement of external relationships indicates the scope of outside contacts the marketing manager must maintain and also serves to place limitations on the extend of such contacts. It is hard to envisage how the marketing manager could be effective in his job over the long run without first-hand contact with others outside the company. Not only must be maintain some feel for what is going on in the market through personal customer and industry contacts, but also he must keep himself up to date on the latest developments in the field of marketing management.

All business today is so much under the influence of goverment regulations that the marketing manager must keep well-informed on the laws and administrative practices affecting marketing of his company`s products and services. Furthermore, through personal effort and through cooperation with industry associations, he must do his part to prevent laws and regulation that place unwise and unwarranted restrictions on the free marketing system.

to be continue to: Internal and External Relationships of Manager