how important is looking at the quality of management when we are looking to buy stocks from a particular company?

The management do plays a key role in deciding what is the next step the company must take to grow the business or how it handles situation that may avert a crisis on hand.

A negative example will be Singpost management who made the wrong decision to purchase US ecommerce companies like TradeGlobal Holdings Inc and Jagged Peak which affected their earnings.

Another example will be Irvins Salted Egg whose 1 of the products had lizards in it. The CEO and management did a great job of doing customer recovery and made no attempts to hide their wrongdoings. This resulted in greater publicity and support for the brand.

It will be tough to know if the management is capable or incapable, only time will tell but looking at their track records will be a good rough gauge.

Very Important - management are the ones who decide on the direction of the firm. If they are unable to instill confidence within the investors, who are people like you, then there won't be anybody willing to hold their stock! Firms are worth something precisely because people want to buy a part of it, and management is a big part of the reason. Just look at the wrong choices that certain management have done thus far in history - Kodak and it's obsession with the film cameras, Sony and their obsession with high quality without regards for price, which have all led to the decimation of alot of market share for these past giants. no matter how good a business model may look then (eg. physical rentals of movies, bike sharing) if you are unable to adapt to the changes of tomorrow, your firm can never hope to succeed in the future.