A visual tool for mapping the integrative postures of a management team

Many studies have examined the roles of managers in organizations. However, very few have drawn explicitly on the concept of integration, which can be usefully deployed, to describe part of managers' functional roles. The purpose of the article is to propose a way of characterising the integrative postures of managers through a mapping tool. This research is concerned with managers' ability to make an entity cohesive while at the same time, accepting the need to differentiate the elements of which it is made up (for example, the various sub-components of an organisation or a team), an ability that is addressed in an heterogeneous literature through the concept of integration. We assume that this kind of ability and orientation has an impact on how managers solve problems and how they should intervene in the various problem-solving processes within the organization. The management team, composed of the organization main unit managers, may be in different configurations depending on each manager integrative skills. Mapping these skills could help recommending the assignment of roles to managers within working groups as well as in the management team. This is the main intention of the mapping tool we propose in this research.