What Are Henry Mintzberg's 10 Management Roles? Video

Welcome to our series on Historical Management Theories That Changed the World. Today we're looking at Henry Mintzberg's Management Roles. 

If you're a leader or manager, you've probably found that your job involves taking on many different roles. One minute you're representing your department at a meeting. Then next, it's up to you to resolve a conflict between team members.

You're expected to keep your team working productively and you're also called upon to show your technical and strategic expertise. It's a challenge to build the skills required for dealing with all these different situations, but Mintzberg's management roles can help.

In his 1989 book, "Mintzberg on Management: Inside our Strange World of Organizations," management expert, professor Henry Mintzberg, identified 10 essential roles that make up the complex jobs of managers and leaders. Mintzberg groups his management roles into three categories.

The first category is interpersonal management roles. These involve providing information and ideas and communicating these to others.

A figurehead is someone who's viewed as an authority. As a manager, people look up to you. Acting as a figurehead covers the social, ceremonial, and legal aspects of your role.

A leader can take charge of a team, department, or organization. This role involves managing people's performance and responsibilities across the group.

The liaison role covers communication and networking within and outside your organization. 

Next are informational management roles. These focus on processing information.

As a monitor, you regularly seek information on your industry. You also keep track of your team's productivity and wellbeing.

Being a disseminator involves communicating useful information with your team.

As a spokesperson, you take responsibility for sharing information about your organization and its goals with an external audience.

Decisional management roles involve using information to make choices.

The entrepreneur role is all about creating and controlling change in your organization. It includes solving problems, coming up with ideas, and putting them into practice.

As a disturbance handler, when something goes wrong, it's your job to take charge. You're also responsible for mediating any conflicts that happen because of it.

In the resource allocator role, you take charge of where your organization's resources go, finding the best uses for funding, personnel, and other assets.

Finally, as a negotiator, you direct or participate in negotiations in your team, department, or organization. 

So which of these roles stood out for you? What ones do you find easy? And what ones do you find challenging? 
You can use Mintzberg's model as a frame of reference when thinking about your own leadership skills and experience, and in particular, about areas you'd like to improve.

Assess the time you devote to each role on a daily basis and look at which of these are most important in your job. If you discover any that are important, but that perhaps you don't spend enough time or effort on, focus on building up those skills.

To recap, Mintzberg's Management Roles   cover interpersonal, informational, and decisional aspects of management. The model can help you to identify your leadership priorities and weaknesses so you can develop your management skills in all the roles you need to perform.

If you want to discover more historical management theories that changed the world, check out our other videos in this series.