Hegemony

Management hegemony is a theoretical perspective explaining how management boards of organizations play the role of management as principal entities. This means that the management boards are the only ones entitled to making most if not all decisions in organizations. Although the governing power rests with the top management commonly known as CEOs, decisive powers are also owned by the management. According to Morten (2007, p. 45) hegemony is more evident in workplaces where board members work on a part-time basis. In case of such scenarios, the management is pressured to produce the best out of the limited resources allocated. This leaves no room to junior employees to contribute in running an organization because they are expected to follow certain strict guidelines.

In work situations, managerial hegemony is known to affect how an organization performs. Organizations may perform extremely well because the management uses hard ways of making employees work. Similarly, an organization may not perform well due to a reduction in the morale of employees. In other words, hegemony in workplaces is usually dictatorial and oppressive in different ways. Morten (2007, p. 45) asserts that hegemony affects some important psychological factors that influence how people behave especially in working places. In addition, hegemony has some sociological effects that grossly damage relations in organizational settings. Any dominant force within and organization should have proper ways of implementing policies without being authoritative. Although studies have shown that the entire power of supervising workers does not rest with management boards, other stakeholders such as shareholders of an organization have little or no effect when it comes to micromanaging affairs of an organization.

Hegemony is probably another version of dictatorship whereby the top officials in an organization dominate the entire running systems. This implies that little or no influence is admissible from other sources different from a certain cliché of leaders. Scandals that have been witnessed in many organizations are associated with hegemony. Leaders chose to make poor decisions without fear of being discovered given that in a normal working day, dominance by senior colleagues is evident. In most scenarios, senior colleagues act as rubber stamps where they make decisions on behalf of others without necessarily consulting them. This experience is common from a personal experience. In most cases, people who tend to have a say especially in the course of group work make decisions for the group without considering views from other people. For instance, class group work is usually coordinated by an individual selected by group members and requested to coordinate the entire group work. Group leaders usually dictate how the group will work, and any suggestions or contrary opinion is rejected. This is oppressive and authoritarian given that one person decides for others what to do.

Hegemony in such scenarios is typical of what happens in organizational management where top managers dictate what junior employees should do. Although this is acceptable in some situations on grounds of experience in management and the need to have leadership in any organization, acting as a rubber stamp is unfair not only to junior colleagues but also to the entire organization. Managerial hegemony is common in virtually all situations. Renz (2007, p. 117) reveals that managerial hegemony is common in many development projects. One-sidedness is common where the project manager decides what should be done throughout the project. This blocks good ideas that could be helpful to a project thus affecting the outcome.