SYNOPSIS The central topic of this thesis is management practice. Since Garment SMEs occupy an important role in Macau, this thesis attempts to find out how these Garment SME managers manage their firms. In order to do this, the research will compare their four functions of management, planning, organising, leading and controlling, with those in management books. However, as will be explained later, planning will be given more emphasis in this thesis. Through this comparison, an idea of how they manage and how far they are from the formal management can be obtained. From the personal interviews, it is found that three out of four of these management functions were not practised in a way similar to management theories.