Management Planning Paper

Lemont Feb 27, 2008

Management Planning Paper

In management, each of the four functions, planning, organizing, leading, and controlling, are crucial to the development of any business. Involving employees in the planning process help them understand the goals of the organization. Planning is analyzing a situation, determining the goals that will be pursued, and deciding in advance the actions needed to pursue the goals. This paper will evaluate the planning function of the Halliburton Company and analyze the impact that legal issues, ethics, and corporate social responsibilities have on management planning along with examples of each, and analyze three factors that influence strategic, tactical, operational, and contingency planning.

Planning is the core area of all the functions of management. Halliburton Company was founded in 1919 and is headquartered in Houston, Texas with an additional headquarter in Dubai, the United Arab Emirates. Halliburton Company provides various products and services to the energy industry worldwide. Halliburton serves the upstream oil and gas industry throughout the lifecycle of the reservoir, from locating hydrocarbons and managing geological data, to drilling and formation evaluation, well construction and completion, and optimizing production through the life of the field. The company operates in three divisions: Drilling, Evaluation, and Digital Solutions; Fluid Systems; and Production Optimization. The Drilling, Evaluation, and Digital Solutions division offers processes coupled with software and hardware solutions to visualize and simulate well activity, while its drilling tools, logging, and perforating technology enables optimal placement and production of the well. The Fluid Systems Division focuses on fluid management and technologies to assist in the drilling and construction of oil and gas wells.

The Production Optimization division tests, measures, and provides means to manage and improve well production, immediately after a well is drilled or after it has been producing for some time (Businessweek, 2008).

The Board of Directors believes that the primary responsibility of the Directors is to provide effective governance over Halliburton's affairs for the benefit of its stockholders. Responsibilities responsibility includes: reviewing succession plans and management development programs for members of executive management; reviewing succession plans and management development programs for members of executive management; reviewing and approving periodically long-term strategic and business plans and monitoring corporate performance against such plans; adopting policies of corporate conduct, including compliance with applicable laws and regulations and maintenance of accounting, financial, disclosure and other controls, and reviewing the adequacy of compliance systems and controls; evaluating annually the overall effectiveness of the Board; and reviewing matters of corporate governance

(Halliburton, 2008).

Company policy requires directors, employees and agents to observe high standards of business and personal ethics in the conduct of their duties and responsibilities. Directors and employees must practice fair dealing, honesty and integrity in every aspect of dealing with other company employees, the public, the business community, shareholders, customers, suppliers, competitors and government authorities. Halliburton believe in giving back as a way to strengthen individuals and the communities where operations exist. The company gives back to communities by supporting a wide variety of charitable organizations, with an emphasis on those that are most important to their employees and customers (Halliburton, 2008).

However, Halliburton was involved in a scandal that was totally against company policy, code of conduct and ethical principles. For example, Halliburton was under scrutiny for the manner in which they had made trades and accounted for revenues and expenses. The scandal at Halliburton had a great deal to do with the capacity of the political administration in Washington to rectify the greed and dishonesty. Halliburton is a major provider of engineering services, particularly to the energy sector. Halliburton's accounting practices on cost overruns on construction jobs was investigated. The former CEO of Halliburton, who was in charge when those accounting practices were introduced, Dick Cheney, currently Vice President of the United States. A suit was filed that alleged Mr. Cheney conspired, along with others at Halliburton, to file false financial statements and thereby mislead investors. The suit claimed Halliburton's deceptive accounting procedures led to overstatements of revenue amounting to as much as $445 million in a three-year period during Mr. Cheney's tenure as CEO (Gutman, 2002).

Today's competitive environment requires managers to continually upgrade the skills and performance of employeesвЂ"and their own. Such constant improvement increases both personal and organizational effectiveness. It makes organization members more useful in their current job and prepares them to take on new responsibilities (Bateman, Snell, 2007). Some factors that influence Halliburton strategic, tactical, operational and contingency planning are diversity training, staffing, performance appraisal, and so forth.

Diversity training focus on building awareness of diversity issues as well as providing the skills employees need to work with others who are different from them. Programs that focus on identifying and reducing hidden biases against people with differences and developing the skills needed to manage a diversified workforce create value.

For example, Halliburton diversity of their employees enhances the company business culture, diverse suppliers improves supply chain and enable the organization to better manage their business and help contribute to the communities in which they work and live. Halliburton believe that having a successful supplier