EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

The effectiveness and the efficiency of the management depend on the managerial qualities of the manger and the way he performs his duties to maximize the followers’ confidence on self-motivation. This report consists the way to use the Management functions and the Managerial skills to upgrade the level of standard in the Cinema exhibit industry in day today activities.

Each and every industry is having difficulties with upcoming financial and non-financial risks to be identified and determined the appropriate solutions, which is what managers are accountable for. Throughout this report describes practical implementations of these functions in number of identical situations.

The major objective of the management is supporting their organization to utilize the best use of its resources to reach to their goals. This report is able to describe the way to use and manage the material and human resources in an effective way to fulfill their expectation of the company vision.

INTRODUCTION

“Management is the art of getting things done through others and with formally organized groups” which is the definition given by the Harold Koontz (1984), henceforth, Managers are facing number of practical difficulties in order to get succeeded with current issues of the market.

My effort is to realize the nature of the current market operation in Sri lanka, in having a valuable interview with the experienced middle line Manager who started his career from the very bottom level and promoted himself. During the period of his service, he was facing multiple challenges and obstacles could be found throughout this report.

I do have an optimistic view by interviewing him; have learnt much more knowledge about the practical situation of the contemporary management, wishing you would also experience this throughout the report.

First time I met Mr. Thusara Perera long time ago at the field meeting held in a famous hotel in Kandy, He was representing his company and delivered the meaningful speech for the audience. I inspired about his speech content and we became good friends. When I asked him that, would like to do an interview about his career and challenges, he was cheerfully accepted and allocated me a time to build up a conversation. The below here is the subscription of his thoughts and real experiences he faced.

The functioning of the “Ceylon theaters PVT LTD”

The Ceylon Theaters is one of the oldest Cinema exhibit and distribute industry started since the beginning of the 19th century which was the glorious era in Sri lankan Sinhalese Cinema industry is still owned by a “Padge” family. Therefore, the culture of this company is one person family oriented and higher politics can be found even the CEO is also being appointed by the personal friend of the owner. Henceforth, from the period of decade the annual net profit and the turnover has been declined gradually, this situation occurred massive disruptive and the company decided to appoint Mr Thushara in order to overcome this difficulties. So, he received heavier burden on his shoulders than expected.

The Understanding and application of the management functions

Once he visited different locations of the Cinemas, realized that the Cinema mangers include the staff do not have targets and set up goals to achieve, also they follow the usual operational way what they continuously followed from the past which is not effective. He has changed the system by giving them weekly ticket sales, Café sales and spot advertisement targets to achieve each and every different location with regarding to their customer volume. In addition, he introduced loyalty card system for the loyal customers bind with the industry and encourages them by sending each week movie line up to their e mail addresses which is highly effective on as the way of direct marketing plus count down the numbers of fixed customers are maintain the industry. This is reminding me the managerial function of “planning” what he got inside him.

In addition, he realized three of their cinema locations located inside the shopping centers where people is mostly gathered but the ticket counters staff members attend before the thirty minutes of tickets issuing, this situation is avoiding the customers to purchased tickets for the movies in advanced, therefore, he introduced advanced ticket booking counters where allocate staff to assist with customers. He provided supplement staff training to understand the consumer behavior and provide outstanding customer care in relating to the international level. Apart from that, some of the locations got excess staff and some of the locations do not have enough, so that, he organized and allocated enough staff for each and every location. This is emphasis the “organizing” skills of him.

These stages of transformations lead sufficient motives to motivate the staff and get empowered. However, he became a directive and supportive character with Cinema line managers by giving them appropriate directions to achieve targets in an efficient and effective manner. Henceforth, the path is not so smooth with multiple challenges and obstacles even in day today Sri Lankan market. I’ll explain this more in later. Mr. Thushara became an interpersonal character by influencing the Cinema managers to do appropriate selections on hit and flopped movies to gather more crowds around the cinema for profit making purpose. These are the areas of “leadership”. He is consisting of an expert power, with the relevant experience and the training he achieved from India in relating to this industry helps him to provide motivation for his followers.

Not only planning but also make sure that those plans are implementing in productive manner which was examined and inspected by him during his visits, therefore no one is able to hide themselves because they know their superior is paying more attention for the progress. This situation turns to convince on him that what actual planned is implementing in proper manner and routine in order to achieve company short term and long term goals. He established the system “week review progress” to evaluate the accuracy and efficiency of it. This is the quality of “controlling”.

Overcome challenges and difficulties with the usage of Managerial skills

There were two identical different challenges he faced in before two years and the recent times which were highly affected the turn over and the brand reputation. Once, there was a bedbug infection incurred at one of the location and had bitten patrons whilst they were watching movies. This was became a viral and majority of the people avoided the location even to visit. He was able to identify the danger come towards, and the future failures with the better understanding of conceptual skills, therefore, he used to implement bedbug treatments in immediate way and upgrade the standards of the facilities. In addition, he was able to acknowledge the people about these standards by public advertisements which convince them the ensuring safety.

In addition, He got a wise knowledge in this business by having training from India about the film exhibit industry and the technology. Once he realized the way to overcome ground level competition is introducing the latest technology. He introduced 4K latest digital projectors for each and every Cinema locations to upgrade the standards of picture quality. This is indicating the value being the expert in this industry which could be taken as an example of “technical” skills.

With the necessary knowledge and experience, he selected energetic employees and trained them for a particular element of job acceptation and somehow make them specialized in their job. This is relevant with obligations of the scientific management concept. The projectionist at the Majestic Cinema used to be a team member before, but Mr. Thushara realized skills he obtained and after a particular training made him the projectionist. As I mentioned in the beginning there was another recent challenge he faced after the bomb explosion in Sri lanka. In one hand, it reduced the customer attendance and also created a fear among the staff members in attend to the work. He motivated the staff by arranging seminars, providing precautionary advice on their own safety and let the staff to convince that these issues would be overcome in near future. These are very much good examples to realize his “Human skills”.

CONCLUSION

By all counts, and with proven results, there is no any doubt that this current operational manger placed favorable performance in purposely to maximize potentials of the management structure. He accepted challenges and overcome the difficulties came towards to him. It is an additional value for the employees to seek and empowered themselves with the knowledge and the abilities. Throughout the interview even I was fortunate to learn much more about his vision and the qualities of the leadership combine with the senior management experience.

My recommendation is this operational manager is the resource for the company with his capability the company is able to achieve their upcoming goals in the future.