A company’s level of performance will determine if a manager is successful or effective. However, there are a couple of traits that differentiate whether a manager is effective or successful. Paradoxically, both terms are often used interchangeably, nevertheless,

we will discover if the two terms are intertwined. In my opinion, a successful manager is one who assumes the responsibilities of overseeing the day-to-day operations within the company and ensures that there is a high volume of profitability, exceedingly high-quality performance measures with the integration of top-tier level-three productivity.

A successful manager is able to motivate his/her staff to achieve greater success by boosting an organizations profit margin. The overall success of a company is predicated upon a managers leadership ability. An effective manager is one whom is efficient in their administrative duties. An effective manager is prone to being quickly promoted as a result of executive level evaluations from the top-down hierarchy. I find that both (effective and successful managers) are equally important because a greater achievement can be accomplished, however; if I had to choose one over the other,

I would have to state that I would consider a successful manager the most important, as a result of their ability to generate substantial amount of wealth, produce growth and maintain massive productivity levels. I would consider an effective manager expendable compared to a successful manager. Discovering the true nature of managerial work by exploding some of the myths of the past and extending the work of Mintzberg and Kotter undoubtedly contributes to our knowledge of management. However, of more critical importance in trying to understand and find solutions to our current performance problems is singling out successful and effective managers to see what they really do in their day-to-day activities (Luthans, 1988).

The successful-versus-effective phase of our real managers study consisted of analyzing the existing data based on the frequencies of the observed activities of the real managers. We did not start off with any preconceived notions or hypotheses concerning the relationships between successful and effective managers. In fact, making such a distinction seemed like splitting hairs because the two words are so often used interchangeably (Luthans, 1988). Nevertheless, we decided to define success operationally in terms of the speed of promotion within an organization. We determined a success index on a sample of the real managers in our study. It was calculated by dividing a manager’s level in his or her organization by his or her tenure (length of service) there6

Thus, a manager at the fourth level of management, who has been with his or her organization for five years, would be rated more successful than a manager at the third level who has been there for 25 years. Obviously, there are some potential problems with such a measure of success, but for our large sample of managers this was an objective measure that could be obtained. (Luthans, 1988).

While I was conducting research to answer this question I stumbled upon an explanation of classical conditioning that I would like to apply to a personal experience but first I will share the explanation I received from Schneck, (2003). According to Schneck, classical conditioning was initially a Pavlovian experiment primarily used to train dogs. The gist of the experiment is this: Pavlov presented dogs with food, and measured their salivary response (how much they drooled). Then he began ringing a bell just before presenting the food. At first,

the dogs did not begin salivating until the food was presented. After a while, however, the dogs began to salivate when the sound of the bell was presented. They learned to associate the sound of the bell with the presentation of the food. As far as their immediate physiological responses were concerned, the sound of the bell became equivalent to the presentation of the food. (Schneck, 2003). Aside from the fact that this experiment was conducted on canines, I would equate this experiment with the ability to retrain someone who is plague with blindness. An individual who teaches newly blind citizens to rethink their strategy of getting around, reading or regaining a sense of normalcy back to their lives. A blind person must re-learn everything they once knew. Instead of relying on their sight, they must now rely on their sense of touch, smell and hearing. They must learn to associate the sounds they hear with vision they use to have.