Time Spent and Importance of Managerial Activities for Senior and Middle Managers in a Banking Unit : Self versus Other Perceptions

Managerial activities and their relationship with self perceptions and other perceptions have been rarely studied in a banking unit. What makes a manager are the nine important managerial activities he/she performs identified from the literature. The time and importance given to these is studied here within the context of the two managerial positions i.e. the senior and the middle managers based on managerial self reports and perceptions in a Pakistani bank. The first aim of the study was to find out the role difference existing between the two groups. The second aim was to find out a match between importance and time spent on the activities of single manager and the third aim was to find out the difference in perception of senior versus middle managers about the activities in a dyadic one to one relationship of a single banking branch. The results of the study revealed that (1). The two management levels due to their different roles differ in time and importance they give on four out of nine activities (2). Dyadic group comparison revealed the existence of disparity between self reports and reports by knowledgeable others on time spent on activities. (3). The comparison of importance of activities exhibited greater number of similarities between the perceptions of one group for the other group. In some instances differences were also observed from which important lessons were learned.


Introduction
In this era of rapid global change, the organizations ought to be familiar with what activities are going on at its senior and middle management tiers (Luthans et al 1988).This work is defined at the senior level of the organizational hierarchy.Most senior managers are concerned with command and control while the juniors take orders and operationalize the management strategy and philosophy (Kraut & Pedigo, 2005).A winning organization is the one in which all its departments and management levels understand each other and work in harmony and cohesion to achieve the aims and objectives as setup higher in the hierarchy (Overvold, 1987).If the two levels of management understand their work properly and know what is expected of each other, a more effective organization ensues (Foti, 1990).
The present work focuses its attention on the two aspects, time given and importance of the nine managerial activities as identified by Luthans et al. (1988) performed at two levels -the upper management staff and the middle management staff in a bank.How much these two management levels are similar and different in giving time and importance to the major activities they perform.Do the middle managers consider the similar activities to be done by the seniors as important as do the seniors themselves and vice versa?What are their own and other tier's perceptions about their work and the activities?What does the staff at senior and middle management levels in a banking unit think of each other?This research paper tries to answer these and question related to the perceptions of employees about their and other's work.
The perceptions are formed on the basis of our five senses and experiences (Myers, 2000).Concerning self and other perceptions, researchers have found that individual's own behavior will be used by him as a source of evidence for his beliefs and attitudes to the extent that the contingencies of reinforcement or the pressure from the environment for engaging in giving false reports would be more subtle or negligible (Bem, 1972).So in vast cases, the self reports are accurate because they reinforce and show one's own beliefs and it is this internal mechanism or program which regulates when we are giving our own opinion -applied to both self and self reporting of others.In the managerial context, both groups of managers base their judgments on experiences they have and could be trusted.Validity of self reports is also very high as a person reporting is expressing the subtleties of his experiences which outside observer cannot fathom and decipher (Kelley, 1967).
So what are the reasons that make some people tend to rate themselves higher than others?A paper published in 2006 by Judge et al explains that the self ratings of some of the leaders i.e. narcissist managers are always higher and on the other hand they rate others low.The authors are of the view that narcissism may be an important liability in jobs where a realistic conception of one's talents is essential.Thus the only thing which can overcome this phenomenon is the scrutiny of self and other reports simultaneously to observe whether discrepancies exist or not and trying to find out their reasons.Self ratings are also higher for those who seek to protect their self esteem or try to defend against threat but the effects are in reality negligible or non existent as proved by the research of Ross et al. (1971).Again by matching self and other reports such problems can be identified and eradicated and verification of self reports can be made.Atwater and Yammarino (1992) have categorized managerial self reports based on their sample of students n=91 (subordinates) and officers n=58 (bosses) from U.S. Naval Academy to be either over-estimated, under-estimated or in agreement with reports by others: superiors or subordinates.The officer/managerial performance were highest where the reports by others matched the self reports and poorest where there was a mismatch connoting the verification of self reports by the other group.This matching can give us the concept of the organization where matches are more or less as it throws light on the mutual understanding of the two organizational groups.
The job of a manager is considered a complex set of activities which he performs on a day to day basis.Some researchers notably Luthans, Welsh and Tailor (1988) have tried to classify the activities and categorized them into the succeeding important jobs.These activities are: (1).planning/coordinating, (2).staffing, (3).training/development, (4).processing paperwork, (5).monitoring/controlling performance, (6).motivating/reinforcing, (7).interacting with outsiders, (8).managing conflict and (9).socializing/politicking.These activities can also be grouped into communication, traditional management, networking behavior and human resource management (Van der Velde et al, 1999).

The Differences between the Two Management Levels
The nine activities derived by Luthan's work are used to know how important they are for each group of management studied and how much time each management group spend on them and how thus are two groups differ on these aspects.These differences have been previously studied also by Kraut and Pedigo (1989) and Van der Velde et al (1999) not specifically targeting banking industry.Thus to know these existing role differences in the units of a private bank between the two management groups, the first two hypotheses of the research are HA1: The time spent on managerial activities differs across the management levels-senior and middle managers.
H01: The two management level groups -senior and middle managers spend equal time on the managerial activities.
HA2: The importance given to managerial activities differs across the management levels-senior and middle managers.
H02: The two management level groups -senior and middle managers give equal importance to the managerial activities.

Differences between Perceptions of Senior and Middle Managers Regard to the Other Group's Activity Importance
As the middle managers were asked about the importance of activities for their senior managers, these results were matched with the self reports of seniors and similarly the reports taken from senior managers about the middle management group were matched with the self reports of middle managers to gauge the answers from a dyadic relationship.Thus the next hypotheses to study self versus other perceptions are HA3: There is a mismatch between perceptions of importance by the senior managers for the activities performed by their middle managers with the self report of middle managers.H03: The reports by the senior managers about the importance of the activities for their middle managers tally with the self report of middle managers.HA4: There is a mismatch between perceptions of importance by the middle managers for the activities performed by their senior managers with the self report of senior managers.H04: The reports by the middle managers about the importance of the activities for their senior managers tally with the self report of senior managers.

Differences between Observations of Senior and Middle Managers Regarding Other Group's Self Reports on Time Given to the Activities
This research does also strive to find out how much the observation versus the self reports in a dyadic relationship on spending time on activities match.The observations versus the self reports have always remained a subject of interest for researchers in social sciences, the practice is done to gauge the validity of self reports which can be utilized in future as surrogate to observations (West & French, 1993) and the importance and accuracy of each method -self reports, reports by knowledgeable informants and behavioral observational varies from situation to situation (Moskowitz, 1986).Thus the next hypotheses resultantly are HA5: There is a mismatch between observations by the senior managers about the time spent on activities by their middle managers with the self report of middle managers.

H05: The reports by the senior managers about the time spent on activities by their middle managers tally with the self report of middle managers.
HA6: There is a mismatch between observations by the middle managers about the time spent on activities by their senior managers with the self report of senior managers.

H06: The reports by the middle managers about the time spent on activities by their senior managers tally with the self report of senior managers.
Here it is important to note that all the hypotheses have nine sub hypotheses based on the nine selected managerial activities.

Methodology
For testing the above mentioned group differences, a large corporate bank in Pakistan was selected.In the Region North of Pakistan it has 97 branches.All branches were selected for the study purpose.As the research targets only the senior and middle management positions in each banking unit, on the basis of management position therefore these groups were separated.In the bank hierarchy, the branch manager is considered the chief executive officer.He is responsible for his branch and all branch operations.Under his control and authority are three departments: operations, credit and trade within the major branches, in other units, at least an operations manager report to him.The branch manager holds the senior most position in the banking unit and is considered part of top management team and has links with group offices.The departments under him have all their senior managers by the name of manager operations, manager credits and trade in-charge.Thus 97 branch managers (Considered senior managers in this study), 97 manager operations and 30 manager credits and trade (Considered middle managers in this study) made up the population which is equal to 224 individuals.Keeping the paucity in response rate in mind, the questionnaire was sent to all managers.A total of 110 managers returned the filled questionnaire of which 65 were middle managers and 45 were senior managers bringing the response rate to 49% which is inline with the managerial response rate of 35.7% widely accepted in the management research (Baruch and Holtom, 2008).
The questionnaire utilized asked about the nine managerial activities from the two groups of managers.The nine activities have already enlisted in the previous section.In the questionnaire therefore after defining each activity briefly, four separate questions were asked from each manager taking care that questions addressed to senior managers enquired about their middle managers and to the middle managers about their senior managers.The questions and the scales associated were first utilized by Professor Van Der Velde in 1999.The questions are How important do you consider this activity (the activity name) for your work?The responses which came after the data gathering activity as stated above comprised of responses from senior managers (45 branch managers), middle managers (65 manager operations, credit managers and in-charge trade) and from the same data set dyadic groups were made (44 pairs: comprising of 44 branch managers and 44 manager operations from a matching branch were formulated).Based on these records, two types of tests were applied to calculate the requisite group differences.Independent sample t-tests were used for the verification of hypotheses 1 and 2 in which the combined mean of question one and three of two separate groups were matched.This test was used because it combines the values of one group of managers and matches with the other group requisite in the study.For hypotheses 3 to 6, paired sample t-tests were conducted to know whether there are differences in perceptions of seniors for middle managers and middle managers for seniors related to time and importance of activities (44 senior managers were matched with 44 middle managers from the same unit).

Hypothesis 1
To know the variability in spending time on managerial activities of the two groups, independent sample t-tests were utilized which gave the following results.
The hypothesis concerning the difference between managerial level and managerial activities (Interacting with Outsiders, t-value = 3.077 with Significance 003; Staffing, t-value = 3.003, Significant at .003;Planning/Coordinating, t-value = 2.455, Significance = .016and Processing Paperwork, t-value = 2.021, Significant at .046) on time spent was substantiated.
The five activities on which hypothesis support did not occur and hence equal time is spent by the two groups are: Socializing/Politicking, Managing Conflict, Monitoring Controlling Performance, Motivating Reinforcing and Training and Development.On the four activities as mentioned above on which variability was encountered are Interacting with Outsiders, Staffing and Planning/Coordinating on which senior managers spend more time than the middle managers; conversely on the activity of Processing Paperwork, the middle managers spend more time than their seniors.

Hypothesis 2
For hypothesis 2, we required to check whether the activities are equally important to both groups or not, the results are given below.
The difference between managerial level and managerial activities (Staffing, t-value = 3.126 significant at .002;Planning/Coordinating, t-value = 2.006 significance level .047and Processing Paperwork, t-value = 2.143 with significance .034)was substantiated.
Here again, out of nine activities three differences were supported by the data and on six activities equal importance was given.The activities of training/development, managing conflict, motivating reinforcing, socializing/politicking, monitoring controlling performance and interacting with outsiders are equally important to both groups in a bank.For the senior managers however, the activities of Staffing and Planning/Coordinating are more important than middle managers for which group Processing Paperwork is more important than the other group.

Hypothesis 3
This hypothesis is about how much self versus other perceptions of middle managers versus their senior managers match with respect to the importance of activities.The perception of senior managers in the bank studied matched with the self reports of middle managers in maximum number of activities.Only exception to this rule is processing paperwork (t-value = 2.1 significant at .041), which middle managers for themselves consider more important and senior managers consider less important for their middle managers, thus HA5 did not get substantiated in eight out of nine activities which in this case was the objective as well.

Hypothesis 4
In this hypothesis the order is reserved.Now we have senior managers self reports and middle managers other reports regarding the importance of activities.There is a mismatch in only two activities.The activities are planning coordinating (t-value = 4.33, significance = .001)and staffing (t-value = 2.78 with significance .008).On these activities the importance given by senior managers is much higher than the middle managers think about them.This implies that the middle managers at their level are unaware of the importance of planning/coordinating and staffing at a senior level which might result in problems when middle managers themselves make transitions to the senior level posts.

Hypothesis 5
The hypothesis number five is about self versus other observations i.e. how much time a middle manager report he spent on the activity and matching it with how much time he spends according to his immediate boss perception -the dyadic relationship.According to the data the time spent self reports by the middle managers on six activities matches with what the senior managers observed (Paired sample t-tests were used), but the activities of planning/coordinating (t-value = 2.19 significant at .034), staffing (t-value = 2.17, significance = .035)and monitoring/controlling (t-value = 2.25 significant at .029) do not match in accordance with the self reports of the middle managers.On all these three activities the senior managers have underestimated their middle managers or the middle managers have overestimated themselves.Nevertheless there is a high accuracy rate in the reports by seniors for their middle managers in maximum number of the activities hence the partial support of HA5.

Hypothesis 6
In hypothesis number six, change of the equation takes place; here the middle managers are the observers and the senior managers give their self report on the time they spend on the managerial activities.Most of the activities, the middle managers have observed of their senior managers are in congruence with the self reports of time spent by the senior managers except for motivating/reinforcing (t-value = 2.81, significance .007),and interaction with outsiders (t-value = 2.25, significance .029), in which senior managers overestimate themselves or middle managers underestimated them.Thus H06 has also been partially supported.Note: 1 = Unimportant; 2 = Little Important; 3 = Somewhat Important; 4 = Important and 5 = Very Important.

Discussion
The research leaves us with a number of important lessons learned.The first lesson is that for senior and middle level managers, the most important activity no doubt is planning/coordinating and the least important is socializing/politicking (from the mean results in table 2 where for the senior managers the importance given to planning/coordinating is 4.93 and for middle managers is 4.78 and for socializing/politicking the values are 3.28 and 3.49 respectively).The other activities fall variedly in between.Then the activity on which senior managers spent most of the time is interacting with outsiders and the middle managers spend considerable time on three activities namely monitoring/controlling performance, processing paperwork and interacting with outsidersthe whole gamut of their work (The results are from table 1 and 2).
Then we have also learned that the senior managers give more importance to planning coordinating and staffing than their middle managers which means that when you rise up in the hierarchy, your importance for these activities changes considerably.At the middle management level in a bank you are more interested in day to day affairs of running and keeping an eye on the work force and operations which are going on which demand the attention on paperwork as well.The account opening, keeping the files up to date and attention to such details is very important to you, but at a higher echelon you are more concerned with the overall state of the unit for which you need more planning and coordinating.The bigger picture presents the problem of hiring an excellent staff.Your staff is what makes your working unit and now you have a better say with the HR department as well that who should be and who should not be put in a specific job.Therefore according to the research data you give more importance to the activity stated as well.
At a higher echelon the importance given to planning coordinating and staffing translates into more time given to these activities as well.One thing which previously was important to a middle manager in a bank was interacting with outsiders but now it becomes obvious that as in charge of the working unit the senior manager has to spend more time on it.Every outsider is welcome at all times down in the hierarchy as well but especially at this level senior has to arrange for the meetings if they are not forthcoming and increase the customer base.Indeed more stress is on the senior manager than the middle manager to increase the business and do the requisite expansions therefore he needs more time for this activity.
The other activities are as much important to middle managers as the senior managers and they spend equal time on them as well.To demonstrate the case one such activity which was very important before and very afterwards is monitoring and controlling performance.Both tiers spend considerable time on it which shows its importance for both the management tiers.
Positive significant correlations existed between activities being important and time spent on these by the management of bank (See table 3 below).For some activities the correlations are strong but for some they are weak.At least three activities in the table can be identified by having relatively stronger correlations i.e. socializing politicking, interacting with outsiders and processing paperwork.It can be construed from these results that there is a difference in the level of importance and the amount of time given to the activities by the managers but these two variables fluctuate together for the managers in a banking unit.Implications for the managers for the mismatches in self versus other perceptions regarding activity importance again show two activities which the senior managers regard for themselves important but the middle managers do not regard important for them are planning coordinating and staffing.Thus in their frame of mind, the middle managers were unable to judge that for these activities what actually happens when you move up in organizational hierarchy and how the importance of these shifts higher.On their part, the seniors have misjudged the importance of processing paperwork's for their middle managers.But the good news is that it is only this activity which shows differences in opinion.One lesson to learn from this exercise for the middle managers is that although they consider processing paperwork very important for themselves, their senior managers do not consider it very important for them.The senior managers should be advised to consider this activity important for their middle managers if they really care about a smooth and functioning work environment.The efficiency of middle management will improve greatly if organization facilitates them and consider this activity as much important for them as they consider it important for themselves.
The reporting done by two level managers do not collate regarding time spent on the activities of motivating/reinforcing and interaction with outsiders.The middle managers have observed that the senior managers spend less time on these while according to the senior managers self evaluation they spend more time on them.One explanation for this result might be that though the senior managers are genuinely spending time at motivating/reinforcing workforce but their actual behavior is not showing in the work environment.One solution to this may be a more proactive approach in employee motivation.Your workforce should know that how much sincere you are in motivating/reinforcing them and it should demonstrate in the actions too.The interaction with outsiders activity as well shows same problems.The middle managers failed to observe this activity accurately which means that either the seniors have overstated the fact or the middle manager's reports are devoid of correctness which might be due to their oversight of what is actually happening at the work environment.
There is a mismatch as well on the time observed on planning coordinating, staffing and monitoring controlling which the middle managers say they spend more time on but the senior's reports contradict it.The seniors have not observed higher time on these and this mismatch might be the result of middle managers expanding on what they actually do or the failure of observation by the senior managers.This also means that for spending time on activities self and other reports cannot be trusted fully and other means i.e. direct observation or mechanical means can be applied in organizations.

Limitations
The data gathering activity for this research took place over a large area -the Region North which has seven sub areas and covers one fourth of the country.The researchers were able to collect the data in six months in which the managers in twenty five branches in two areas Rawalpindi and Islamabad were visited in their offices and the questionnaire was hand delivered to them, for the rest of the branches in five areas, the mode of delivery was by mail along with the return envelope.The mail delivery was supplemented by a telephone call to the recipients.In spite of these precautions the return rate from the branches where the mode of delivery was by mail was low.
As the nine managerial activities included in this paper were deciphered in the United States in five industries (Luthans et al. 1988) and were considered generic, it was understood that the same activities occurred in a Pakistani bank.Prior to data gathering, the questionnaire was discussed with the branch managers and operation managers who agreed that the activities included the whole gamut of their work.

Ideas for the Future Research
Although this research only focuses on the two management levels of the banking unit in a Pakistani banking institution, the results can be applied specifically to the Pakistani private banks and more generally to the privately owned banks in the world.All the banks world over have a similar structure and working operations thus the importance given to and time spent on the activity would be similar but the perceptions might vary for which more research is required.During the course of the research, the importance and time spent on activity was also correlated with employee's age, his education and tenure in the company which did not show any significant results.Moreover the different area's data also show similar outcomes which confirm our finding that the importance given and time spent is a factor of the position itself of the respondent and not the other factors like age, culture and experience.
In the past, at least two authors, Professor Luthans (1993) who identified the managerial activities and Mandy Van der Velde (1999) have worked on the activities and found their relationship with the managerial positions.They also point out that the senior managers spend more time on interacting with outsiders (external networking); the fact which has been generally confirmed by this research.Other than this aspect the past studies on senior managers show that they spend more time on planning related activities and less time on paperwork which has also been verified by the study.Thus many aspects from the past research have been found to be true for the Pakistani environment as well and many new insights into the Pakistani banking management system were gained by the research.
This research per se identified the differences between the management levels vis-à-vis the activities but has not identified the reasons for these differences.An attitudinal study is advised for the future researchers in which reasons like prior belief systems, experience and training of the manager can be regressed to the importance and time given to the activity by the managers of both groups.

Recommendations
In light of the research results it is recommended that the managers in a bank should be trained for the senior and middle level posts keeping in mind the importance and time spent on the activities they perform.The branch managers in a bank spend considerable time on interacting with outsiders, monitoring controlling performance, motivating reinforcing and planning coordinating while the middle managers spend considerable time on monitoring controlling performance, processing paperwork and interacting with outsiders.As for the importance of activities, it should be understood that eight out of nine activities discussed are important to very important for both senior and middle managers except for politicking and socializing which is somewhat important to both management levels.
It is also recommended that when a middle manager moves to the higher post of a branch manager he should be informed that for a higher management post the activity of planning coordinating and staffing is more important.
According to the research results, the activity performed by the middle managers which is little understood by the senior managers was processing paperwork.The senior managers in a banking environment should be briefed about its importance so that the seniors facilitate their juniors and provide necessary guidance for their work.
When the self reports on time were matched with reports by knowledgeable others -in this case senior managers and middle managers, the discrepancies did occur on five out of nine activities establishing that the contradictions can occur between self and other reports and these reports should be supplemented with direct observation in an office environment.

Table 1 .
Independent sample t-test and mean comparisons between senior managers and middle managers on time spent on managerial activities based on employee self reports

Table 2 .
Independent sample t-test and mean comparisons between senior managers and middle managers on importance given to the managerial activities based on employee self reports

Table 3 .
Correlations between the importance of the activity and time spent on the activity by managers