Office Management

Purpose of an Office

The term "office" can be defined as any place where records are prepared, handled and preserved for subsequent reference, and making them available as and when required.

Office Management

Modern offices remain the integral part of organizations. Managers primarily depend on the office for their managerial functions. These offices collect and store necessary data for the managers to evaluate and take necessary decisions based on the records available in the office. Availability of previous records makes the manager to take fast and accurate decisions and give directions. It makes the job easier for the manager. It is the office that provides the documents, records, and data of the past and present. So modern offices play a vital role in the business of modern organizations. In our daily life we visit many offices like - post office, government office, municipal office, school office, college office, transport office, electricity office, telephone office, company office, the office of the advocate, office of professionals, etc. We visit these offices for some work or the other where we can get our work done within the shortest possible time. If you are able to manage the work done easily and without much hassle, you feel it is an efficient office. However, if you are not able to get the work completed even after frequent visits and efforts, you consider it an inefficient office. Private offices are considered as efficient offices than the government offices where you get stuck for absurd reasons.

Meaning of Office

Technology is growing rapidly. Human relations are spreading all over the world. The market is now becoming global. Technology is changing rapidly. If an organization has to sustain in this ever-changing world, they need to change according to the current global trend. In the present circumstances it is the requirement of every organization to keep a watch over the changes and provide necessary information, records, and data for the various purposes of different persons in the organization on the right time at the right manner in an economical way as per the need. Presently it is the fundamental requirement of an enterprise to perform such work. And these activities remain the important services performed in an office. Maintaining records, contact details, communication, and management of persons and their records are performed in the office.

When you think about an office, the immediate impression is that a clerk sitting on a chair with some files on the table and some officers sitting and completing some paperwork in a particular building. But doing paper work in a particular place routinely is not the key function of the office. The traditional view of an office held even today is that office work is concerned exclusively with the records of the organization. Making records, preserving records, and using records at the appropriate time for different departments. Another view is that providing clerical assistance to the various departments represent the function of an office. Which does not have any productive activity, but it only performs routine clerical activity is the general view about an office.

The traditional view does not explain all the functions performed inside the office. The modern view is that the office is the administrative center of the business where records are prepared, preserved, and made available for the purpose of efficient management of the organization.

In a broad sense office represents service functions which involve clerical work, receiving data and records, supplying data and records, preserving data and records, analyzing data, mailing letters, typing, and duplicating documents, preserving documents, maintaining files, receiving letters, assisting communication, etc. for the efficient management of the organization. All these clerical activities are performed in the office and constitute the office services. The term "office" can be defined as any place where records are prepared, handled and preserved for subsequent reference, and making them available as and when required.


It is the nature of the work that is significant neither the person who does it nor the place where it is performed.

Scope of the Office Activities

Creating records, collecting data, preserving records, processing, and supplying information to business managers who require it for decision making are the main activities performed in an office. It additionally includes the processing and presenting numerical data in the form of reports and statements, facilitating internal and external communication, handling outward and inward correspondence.

Record management includes receiving various documents, copying, filing papers, classification of files, preserving files, duplicating records, and arranging them in a manner to locate the same easily and quickly which needs to be made available to the suitable person at the right time and in the right form. Public relations through the press release and notifications and to respond to public inquiries and complaints, collecting public opinion and conveying it to the management also comes under the scope of the office function.