Management as we know today has been evident in armed forces and religious institutions for centuries; and the earliest professionally managed organizations were the military and the church. But the formal set of principles, theories and concepts – well researched and documented appeared only in the early part of this century with the emergence of Frederick Taylor of
Management has been defined over the period of time by many thinkers and researchers in different ways. However the two most commonly accepted definitions are: firstly – "The management is optimum utilization of resources for achieving organizational objectives" and secondly - "Management is a process of conversion of resources into results". The underlying theme in both the definitions are similar i.e. there are resources, organizations-created to serve certain need of the society and environment, and process of converting resources into result to satisfy the 'felt need' of the environment. Hence there is a play of three factors – organization, resources (physical resource, human resource and informational resource) and the result. The process of optimum utilization of resources that converts resources into results involves management functions collectively called as the 'management process' such as forecasting, planning, organizing, directing, coordinating and controlling.
The two key areas of any management are the management of human and resources, whereas human itself is a resource.
Business management and Defence Management
Now, a question – is there any such things as "Defence Management" at all? Many people opined that the management principles, concepts and theories are the same whether these are applied to business, industries or defence; then what is so special about the "Defence Management"?
The essential difference between 'business management' or 'defence management' lies in the key words the 'organization's objectives' which are determined by the "felt needs" of the environment that has created the organization. Defence services have been created by the nation to satisfy the "felt need" of achieving national security aim through military means if such situation is forced upon the nations. But in the field of business the "felt need" is to earn profit and organizations are created to achieve those objectives.
The objectives or results expected from the defence services are to provide the nation with national security by military means from external aggression by conducting war as and when such situation is forced upon the nation. At other time it would be necessary to be operationally ready and be available to persecute such a war at the given notice; and this involves evolution of tactics, doctrines, creation of infrastructures and training.
As the objectives of defence services are established then the resources to achieve these objectives have to be in order. The physical resources must be in terms of weapon systems, equipment, materials including war-like stores and finance of an awesome magnitude - The human resources relates to the various functions such as command or as staff which play a key role in utilizing and optimizing all resources; and - The informational resources for intelligence become all the more important in this context.
Hence, in a holistic way it can be said that defence management deals with theories, concepts, and techniques for forecasting, planning, directing, coordinating and controlling human, physical and informational resources for achieving the aims of the national security through operations on land and/or sea and/or air and being prepared for these at all times by creating the infrastructures for waging war i.e. through training, logistics and intelligence. Thus the very scale of resources and criticality of the objectives to be achieved by the defence services make the concept of defence management markedly different from the concept of management in any other field such as business and industries. Furthermore, understanding the various dimensions of national security and the varied and complex nature of interplay between the resources used for creation and maintenance of force structures become the central theme for training of officer in defence management.
Scope of Defence Management
It involves the study of all matters related to:
- Creation of combat forces
- Maintenance and support of combat forces
- Employment of combat forces
All these activities require management i.e. getting desired result from the given resources.
Defence Resource Management
Defence resources management is concerned with the allocation and effective use of resources in modern defense organization; and it is based on the economic reasoning which deals with the basic tenet of scarcity of resources relative to competing needs and wants. This implies:
- Allocating scarce resources to competing needs; and
- The optimum utilizations of resources; and cost effectiveness is achieved through
§ Maximizing benefits within existing resource constraints, or
§ Minimizing resources consumption while achieving a predetermined level of benefit.
The principle of optimum utilization of resources for achieving objectives and the process of converting resources into results in defence management is the most challenging task; since the colossal amount of money involved in the physical resources is of awesome magnitude which would be beyond the imagination of other field of management in industries and businesses.
Difference Between Business Management & Defense Management
| | Business / Industry | Defence Service |
| Area of Activities | Production, Marketing, Finance, Personnel, Industrial Relations etc. | Operations, Operation Logistics, Logistics, Trainings, Intelligence etc. |
| Functional Environment | Competitions exist: Market influences force to utilize modern management technique to survive and flourish. | No Competition or Market influence: This demands for deliberate attempts from “within” to obtain the best from the resources allocated to them by the nation. |
| Finance as a function | Financial Resources are far too less compared to defence service. No business house or industry will ever use such a colossal amount of money each year. | Financial Resources are Huge: It is always in terms of some percent of National Budget of a country. The Country like |
| Prospective Plan | No Long Prospective plan of 15 years or more. | Prospective planning for 15 years or more. |
| Training | It is subsidiary or incidental activities. | Training is very important and is a distinctive area of activity. Whenever the Armed Forces are not at war, they are training for war. |
| Personnel | Human being as a resource whose contribution or productivities are measured in terms of profit as a bottom line. | Human being in Armed Forces assumes different significance and they are motivated to supreme sacrifices. So, human resources are looked into different perspectives. |
Logistics management
The logistics management forms the most important part of whole of the defence management. The rapid technological changes have forced changes in the military strategy and tactics at an unprecedented pace but with corresponding increase in cost involved. Therefore to strike a balance between combat effectiveness and cost involvement; an effective and efficient equipment management system is required in defence services. This demands a systematic and scientific approach in logistics management which encompasses entire gamut of need, acquisition, employment and discard of weapon system and their ancillaries. The main aspects of logistics management are material management, weapon and equipment management, and operational logistics and contemporary logistics management technique. Logistics concepts of weapon and equipment management ensure the availability of 'high quality' in the 'right condition' and at the 'right cost'. The larger logistics concepts in weapon and equipment management are concerned with the complete weapon and equipment life cycle concept (Womb to Tomb), life cycle costing, life cycle of technology, economic life and ultimate management decision. The Service Head Quarter/Ministry level makes the ultimate decision for introduction or replacement of major weapon system or platforms like aircrafts, tanks, ships, submarines, surveillance system and alike.
Finance Management
This is most important aspect of whole of the Defence Management. No enterprises manage budget of such high magnitude like the defence services does. Thus the financial management skills as required by a defence manager would be substantially different from the skills of industries & businesses which deal with such things as various ratios, balance sheet, working capital management, cash flow analysis etc; hence this becomes an exclusive field of expertise.
Strategic Management
Among many aspects 'defence management' encompasses strategic management as one of the important subjects. Due to advent of rapid communication coupled with the unprecedented social change, the environments in which the organization exists are constantly subjected to dynamic change. So the organization has to pay due attention to the changes and cope with it to serve and prosper.
Strategy is concerned with the relationship between "Ends & Means", "Power & Objectives'', "Capabilities & Intentions", and "Forecasting & Foresight". National Security Strategy is defined as the nation's plan for coordinated use of all instruments of state power – military and non-military to pursue objectives that defend and advance National Interest. According to Liddle Heart – "Strategy coordinates and directs all the resources of a nation toward the attainment of the political objective of war." In an ever-changing environment, a deliberate focus on the changing needs require futuristic thinking and this prepares a nation and organization to respond to the uncertainties. Strategic management can thus be defined as "The determination of basic and long term goals and objectives; and the adoption of course of action and allocation of resources for carrying out the goals".
Defence management in Nepal
The objectives or results expected from the defence services i.e. Nepal Army are to defend our nation from external aggression, ensure national security and protect national interest from the internal threat, participate in UN peace keeping missions by contributing troops and resources and to participate in the nation building & development projects. If we have to talk about Defence Management in
The financial management skills as required by a defence manager are not competent and system lacks developing and provisioning of such of skilled human resources. The military expenditure of
The defence procurement required for the Nepal Army could be aircrafts, helicopters, military transports, armoured personnel carriers, earthmoving plants, construction equipments, weapon system (both new and replacement of the old), ammunitions and explosives and special equipments. The plan to acquire them could be through - diplomatic initiative under defence cooperation for free, purchase them in long term payment contract basis, and procure them through direct payment or by other means of provisioning. The aim of such provisioning should be to meet the end or requirements of the army and need to be planned with a vision of cost effectiveness. Ministry of Defence (MOD) has to present the requirements before the Government with ample justifications for demands along with various alternatives of short term, mid term and long term prospective plan. Government need to be convinced for long term procurement planning and projection of the budgets accordingly. Remaining within the allocated budget for each fiscal year various combinations of the procurement plans of defence hardware and software has to be drawn and a decision has to be made so as to achieve the optimum utilizations of the resources to get the best of the result. This kind of exercise actually can be called as the "Defence Management", but we are not as yet there to exercise such practice. The existing practice of ad hoc provisioning and in bits and pieces without due consideration of priority based defence planning may not optimally serve the 'felt need' of the defence services and definitely would not come within the parameter of cost-effectiveness. Nepal lacks trained human resources in defence management and skilled financial manager in defence sector both in Ministry of Defence and Army Headquarter; and we are still following the traditional way of doing business without much knowledge and applications of the principles, theories, and concepts of "Defence Management". This is a kind of new subject in Nepalese defence sector and need a lot of improvement.
Conclusion
To strengthen the comprehensive security through examination of the economic, political, social and military aspects one has to examine the defence policy based on the National Security Policy. The study of the defence policy calls for the examination of the results to be achieved and in turn the evaluation of the means to meet those ends or results. This demands a strategic level planning; and this is where the Defence Management plays an important role.
The subject and scope of 'Defence Management' is very vast and it encompasses all the aspects of management science. The functional areas of management in defence differ widely from business/industries. The sum total of "Defence Management" is to contribute in defence planning with other stake holder; and to plan, procure and make optimum utilization of the available resources to meet the strategic and tactical needs of the armed forces.
In defence, these are looked at both from the macro level with distant vision as well as the myriad of activities which has to be monitored closely at micro level to wage a successful war. Thus, defence management concerns itself with all the multitudinous functions with their interdependencies and inter-linkages and seeks to enhance the effectiveness of the fighting forces so that success in war can be assured. Success in war is vital to the nation as there are no prizes for runners up.
References:
- Concept of Defence Management by Air Vice Marshal Kulkarni S. VM
- General Management, Volume – I;
- Strategic Management,
- Financial Management in Defence,
- Logistics management,
- Handouts, Defence Resources Management Institute – Naval
- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_military_expenditures#Stockholm_International_Peace_Research_Institute_figures
- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_budget
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