Sunday, April 27, 2014

Is the behaviors of managers consistent with profit maximization?

Is the behaviors of managers consistent with profit maximization?
In theory, managers act to maximize the profit of their organization, assuming it is a for-profit organization. In fact, however, they have more of a tendency to maximize their personal well-offness. This is true for a number of reasons:

1. Their personal financial incentives are based on things other than the profit of the organization as a whole so they tend to make decisions that maximize their bonus or raise. Such decisions may make themselves look good at the expense of other parts of the company, thus reducing total company profit.

2. Their personal job security my depend on the continued existence of a string of problems that they solve. Getting at the root cause of the problems would eliminate their job so they continue to do their job and keep quiet about a potential way to save the company money.

3. They may feel mistreated or underpaid. They may intentionally cause problems that will be blamed on others in order to "get back" at the company.

4. They may feel the company is mistreating customers and go out of their way to secretly assist customers - adversely to company interests.

There are many other reasons why many, if not most, manager behaviors do not add to profit maximization.

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