CS Foundation Level
Management Principles and Practice cheat sheet
Every chapter's key points, formulas and definitions on one page, for the last week before the exam. Each heading links to the chapter that explains it.
Introduction to management
- Management is the process of planning, organising, staffing, leading and controlling an organisation's resources to achieve its objectives efficiently and effectively; it is both a science and an art.
- Top-level management sets the mission and long-term strategy, middle-level management turns that strategy into departmental plans, and first-line management runs day-to-day tasks with operational staff.
- Mintzberg grouped what managers actually do into ten roles under three categories: interpersonal, informational and decisional.
- In Katz's three-skill model, technical skill matters most at the first-line level, conceptual skill at the top level, and human skill at every level.
- Administration sets policy, management implements it from a formal position, and leadership influences people through personal credibility and trust, so it can arise at any level.
Key terms
- Top-level management
- The board of directors and the chief executive. Sets the organisation's mission, long-term strategy and overall direction, and answers to owners or, in a public body, to the state.
- Middle-level management
- Departmental and functional heads. Translates top-level strategy into departmental plans, coordinates across sections, and reports performance upward while directing supervisors below.
- Lower-level (first-line) management
- Supervisors and team leaders working directly with operational staff. Focused on day-to-day task execution, scheduling and immediate problem-solving.
The rest of the sheet covers
- Evolution and development of management thought
- Planning and organising
- Staffing, leading and controlling
- Enterprise management
- Change management
- Project management
- Marketing management
- Decision making
- Exam technique and revision
- Glossary