The 1960 Book That Brought Us Theory X and Theory Y

Dr. Douglas McGregor

This is probably the most intense book it has ever been my outstanding pleasure to analyze. This publication, penned in the 60’s, is among the most meaningful and by far most relevant management textbooks crafted during the last century. Dr. Douglas McGregor introduces us to X Theory and Y Theory attitudes and assumptions, a pair of fundamentally diverse means by which managers perceive their own staff.

Today, as the information revolution, global economy, and knowledge-driven enterprises take over the industrial landscape, McGregor’s straightforward but stimulating message resonates loudly, perhaps even more so than it did in its own era. Read more…

Sigmund Freud: Father of Theory X Management?

There is substantial consideration that Sigmund Freud’s theory of motivation and assumptions of attitudes and human nature was the origin of Theory X management, as popularized through Douglas McGregor’s exploration of Theory X and Theory Y in 1960.

Sigmund Freud’s Theory X Writings

Given that Sigmund Freud was very vocal about his beliefs about the individual in his 1927 work, The Future of an Illusion (Die Zukunft einer Illusion) wherein he states that human nature cannot attain civilization without coercion because of the individual’s weakness and intrinsic laziness. As such, rules are necessary to regulate relationships and to create welfare for everyone in a community. Sigmund Freud further states the perspective that civilization must protect itself against each individual through regulations, institutions, and commands.

An individual, he believes, must renounce their destructive and antisocial instincts and make sacrifices by restricting these instincts. However, this task to control these masses is held by a minority of the group capable of such renunciation. These Theory X characteristics and expectations are reinforced as he goes on to indicate that the masses are inherently lazy and unintelligent. Having to contend with these lazy and unintelligent masses, group leaders must motivate them to work toward group goals and objectives since, as Freud’s explanation continues, the masses are not fond of work and no arguments or persuasion would be successful to make them renounce these passions and instinctual drives.

With such teachings, is it any wonder that in a Theory X company , the manager believes an autocratic and authoritarian style of management is the only means of getting productivity from the individual worker?

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A Theory X company is run from the top down by Theory X managers. You can tell these guys from a mile away, because they say things like:

• “When I want your opinion, I’ll beat it out of you.”
• “My way or the highway.”
• “I put you in charge of this project because I want a single neck to choke when it falls behind.”

As you can tell, control is paramount for the Theory X manager.

Why do bullies like this still exist, creating these Theory X companies? Because, unfortunately for everyone, this aggressive behavior works. If you tell someone exactly what you want them to do, it’ll get done, even if they know there’s a better way. But this authoritarian and autocratic style only goes so far before it starts to break down. Read more…

This post is written for those folks who are newbies to the world of project management. As is the case with many other fields of employ, project management has its share of unique nomenclature and jargon that can confound those who are just getting started in the field of project management.  In some situations, people from other roles assume a project management position because of the circumstances in which they find themselves.  Below, you will get a head start on a few basic project management terms routinely used in the industry.
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There are three types of organizational structure primarily used in business models today: matrix structure, divisional structure and functional structure. Each of these structures has been noted to have both strong points and weak points. In order to maximize the strong points and minimize the weak points, many companies have adopted a form of all three organizational structure types, resulting in a combined structural model. Read more…

The increased dependence of organizations on project management methodologies for the completion of work that is carried out by teams has called for a differentiation to be brought in between leadership and management. It is really commendable that well-working organizations have realized the fact, processes require management while people need leadership to follow.

From my perspective, process is significant but in project management, it is not necessarily the most major element. While I agree that process is important in most cases, process is not the most important aspect of project management. As a matter of fact, in my opinion, the project management role should be looked upon as a leadership role and comparatively leading teams deserves more attention than the management and control of the process’ mechanics. Undoubtedly some people are born leaders and much better in leading than others. With that in mind, I’d say, the willingness to learn can make an ordinary individual a thorough leader. Read more…

You can’t escape conflict. Conflict management in organizations is an imperative skill, regardless of what you do or where your place of employment is.  It’s so useful, in fact, you can even get a dispute resolution degree. If you deal with people, you are going to need to manage conflict. In extreme cases, a conflict can turn into a spiteful and costly lawsuit or worse. Two team members who experience a conflict of personality can destroy team productivity and leave bad feelings with every team member. That is why it is so important to know the steps of organizational conflict resolution. By following these steps, you can resolve conflict before it is blown out of proportion.

Work Together to Find Out Where the Conflict Started

Often team members will expect a supervisor or some other managing authority to settle a conflict. Unfortunately, putting this responsibility in the hands of another is often disappointing. It is important for team members to learn the steps of organizational conflict resolution themselves so that they can resolve difficulties on their own as often as possible. This will lead to more satisfactory solutions. You really can’t expect a supervisor or manager who does little more than check in with the team occasionally to be able to get to the heart of the matter and find out what the true problem is. However, the person who works right next to you knows what you are doing day-in and day-out and vice-versa. Resolving differences with that person one-on-one will be much more meaningful and lasting than leaving the solution to an uninvolved third party who is highly likely to just want to get it over with.

Aside from that, when you call in an "outsider" to settle differences within the team resolution can quickly turn into a detective play that makes everyone feel as if they are being attacked. What started out as an attempt to solve a problem can end up being nothing more than a round of accusations and hurt feelings. That’s why it is so important for the good of everyone involved to try to resolve conflict within the team before calling management for assistance. The solutions you and your team members come up with are far more likely to be satisfactory to you and therefore to benefit the entire workplace. By appointing a team member to facilitate and working toward inclusion of the needs of the team members involved, any problem can be resolved in a way that enhances the workplace and honors those involved.

Team Led Conflict Resolution Teaches Applicable Lessons

If a team resolves a conflict on its own, the team will be able to apply what has been learned the next time a conflict arises.  These hard fought lessons are the next best thing to getting an actual dispute resolution degree . This is a benefit that the team will miss out on if it needs their managers to resolve conflicts.  Organizations are not concerned with honoring the needs of team members or making adjustments that consider all points of view. They just want the problem to be over and the team to be producing. For this reason, they may not realize or care about inequities such as one team member getting unfair pay increases or other perks. If they see it as furthering their ends, they will make these kinds of decisions. This is when it is important for the team to address the conflicts that arise within the context of the team. By putting a protocol in place within the team for dealing with favoritism, the team will not have to reinvent the wheel the next time the situation arises.

What to Do When Conflict Arises

Recognize your part in the conflict. It takes two to tango, as the saying goes. Although one member of the team may believe that a conflict is entirely the fault of another team member, this is seldom true. Behavior doesn’t happen in a vacuum. If one team member did something that annoyed you, look at your own behavior to see if you might have done something that contributed to that situation. Avoid the temptation to shoot off angry emails or send heated interoffice memos. Remember that words put in writing can come back to haunt you. Keep your conflict resolution at a verbal level so that you can adjust your thoughts as new facts and viewpoints emerge.

What Not To Do When Conflict Arises

Don’t drag lots of people into your attempts at organizational conflict resolution. Remember that too many cooks can spoil the broth. When you have a lot of people involved in a situation you are bound to have gossip, and that never helps anything.

Additionally, avoid engaging in an on-the-spot shouting match. Set a specific time and place to meet regarding the conflict, and then give yourself a chance to cool down, reflect, and organize your thoughts before meeting with the team member and a facilitator to resolve your conflict in a productive and mature manner

Conflict is unavoidable.  Regardless of where you are, conflict is everywhere no matter who you are.  It’s not rare to hear of disputes turning into long, drawn out lawsuits.  Something as simple as a difference in personalities between team members can hinder productivity.  Here are a few ways to help you turn a conflict into a peaceful conflict resolution.

We’ve all been taking the traditional approach to conflict management in organizations by always trying to avoid it.  That’s impractical because no matter how many rules and policies are created to deal with disputes in the workplace, disputes always arise.  Instead, we should concentrate on managing conflict.

Identify the Conflict

It’s better to avoid getting in disagreements for the sake of getting more work done, but many times, co-workers butt heads over ideas and how they are presented.  Instead of turning on one another and resorting to office politics, employees should work together to identify what is causing their lack of productivity.

For example, if a conflict is the result of someone who has too much power over the decision making, it is the responsibility of the other team members to effectively find out what is going on with the troublesome team member and why they are acting a certain way.

Deal with Conflict

Many people are intimidated by the idea of dealing with a disagreeable co-worker, but it doesn’t help anyone if everyone allows a co-worker to continue to cause problems.  In fact, overlooking the problem only communicates to the problematic person that what they are doing is all right, and that they could continue with their unethical behavior.

Again, responsibility lies with the rest of the group or co-workers to deal with the person in order to achieve conflict resolution.  Workers can go to their manager, but it is better to confront the person first.  The important thing is how someone approaches the person who poses a problem to the rest of the office.  If someone is overly confrontational, then things can only escalate if the person becomes upset.

Instead, we should be kind and courteous in the way we speak to the person who has been a problem for the rest of the office.  Point out instances that were particularly upsetting, and always bring another person along for a second opinion.  It’s also a good idea to have written documentation of a co-worker’s problematic actions.

Prevent Future Conflicts

Learn from past conflicts and apply them in the future to prevent an incident from escalating later.  We should be proactive-but not paranoid-when it comes to recognizing small incidents that could possibly escalate into something much worse.

Everyone benefits from a successful conflict resolution.  Done right, no one has to be fired, and co-workers are able to foster a closer relationship with one another.  Co-workers create a stronger bond with one another and are able to deal with problems that may present themselves later on in a more efficient manner.

Among the numerous types of organization management structures, the functional organizational structure finds its place.  An organization needs structure for achieving common goals – the functional model is structured hierarchically with a strong concept of subordination.  Most companies in the modern era rely upon this functional/hierarchical model (cf: Matrix organizational structure ).

In the functional organization, each job becomes the focus point. Similar function-based jobs done by the employees are put together in silos in the functional structured based organizational. Specialization is centralized and employees who are doing these specialized jobs are clustered, thus each unique department is born.

The functional areas will have personnel with varied skills, but those skills are grouped on their similarities. The people who have identical skills can be grouped easily and they can be placed in separate units and a aforesaid organizational structure is formed. The ultimate controlling authority coordinates with all levels which are commonly called the top management. When an organization handles a solitary product, the aforementioned functional organizational structure is most suited and most frequently used.

In such as model, the purchasing function concentrates on purchase activities. Human Resources personnel handle the hiring, training, and firing activities. The accounting department takes care of financial activities. Manufacturing focuses on rolling out the finished product. The sales team takes the role of promoting the finished product in the marketplace. Marketing activities market the product with a long range goal of staying competitive in the market.

The organizational structure with functional focus tries to allocate the available people according to their roles, forming what is referred to as a functional department. Each department usually has a department head with the title of department manager, or something similar. At times, these department heads may be given a title of Director, if the board gives their function such a representation.

Imagine that a functional organizational structure operates in silos, due to the controlling nature used in such structures. When project management is necessary, each project is performed inside a single departmental unit. In the necessity of drawing information or efforts from other departments occurs for project management, it is done by requesting assistance from the other unit. The procedure for getting this cooperation between departments is to route the request through the head of the unit to the other head of the other unit from whom the information is sought. In other situations, the communication flow is restricted inside the functionally silo of the department.

Functional organizational structures are ideal for organizations having a lone product or a cluster of products which can easily group under a single head.

The benefits in utilizing a structure which relies upon the functional model are:

• the chain of command is linear and sound
• The human resource abilities are constantly nurtured by concentrated tutoring, leadership, and guidance
• Professional similarities between the organizational participants in each of the different functional offices
• The development of professional expertise attained by clustering specialists in the present function as a single unit
• Provides an easy path for the employees to grow within the organization sideways as well as upwards in the organizational tree

The drawbacks of the functional organizational structure are

• The decision making process is bureaucratic and far from expedient
• The flow of communication and synchronization between functional departments is complicated
• The speed of resolving problem is slow and inefficient
• Grouping based on functions results in a lack of broader view from employees resulting in narrowed vision of overall organizational objective

Project managers (PM) are naturally considered leaders since they claim near total responsibility for their projects. Though they do not manage the resources in some occasions, still they are project leaders. One cannot take both management and  leadership as the same thing. Yukl defines the terms leader, manager and boss to specify people who play the role of leadership. Here, you’ll see, leadership is used to deal with management as well.

Leadership and management are not the same. An efficient leader always encourages and stimulates his team, to make the members to be more successful contributors, to visualize their unique ideas and finally to act on the call of urgency .

Definition of Leader vs. Manager

Here’s how leadership and management are defined by some management experts.  Maxwell, in his book The 360 Degree Leader has provided meaningful definitions for both manager and leader. He has said that managers execute the tasks with defined methods while leaders themselves work with people. Similarly, Kotter has said in his book, Leading Change , that the key elements like planning, staffing, organizing, problem solving, controlling and budgeting are involved in managing. However, the essential requirements like setting direction, inspiring, motivating and aligning people are involved in leadership.  Kotter further explained that leadership and management are completely different approaches of action. Each of them represents their individual characteristics and tasks. However, to run projects in today’s changing and complex business environment, both management and leadership skills are important.

Leadership is necessary for a number of reasons. For example, to make change in routine business environment, to run set systems and services properly, innovate and create new products. Above all, leadership encourages others to think differently, take risks, and innovate unique things. Well, management makes sure that the methods work successfully.

The Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK) breaks projects down into these five process groups: Initiating, Planning, Executing, Monitoring and Controlling, and Closing. Altogether, PMBOK explains 44 methods of Project Management that barely give importance to the necessity of leadership.

Remember that to be a good project manager, one must be a good leader also. The ability to encourage others in order to make them to reach their maximum potential is very important. Normally, a PM does more than manage a group of tasks on a Gantt chart.

Despite the project manager dedicating to the most expensive and efficient project management tool set to deliver the project timelines, budget, and objectives, great leadership skills are required to make sure that the process goes according plan.

How to Encourage and Inspire Team Members

A project manager often faces ups and downs during his work. Emotionally, a Project Manager is required to handle people’s emotions, to motivate people when they get disappointed, to take the teams together during the difficult times, and finally to make sure that they have concentrated on the goals of the project.

However, it’s obvious that this role is not an easy one. A PM has to realize key aspects about the individuals who are the members of the team like their personalities, what gets them energized, and how to encourage them, effectively. The main strategy here is to understand the members and show the true leadership which means being dependable and motivating.

A project leader must establish an emotional connection with each member of the team personally. This causes each team member to think about the project more emotionally rather than simply as a source of paycheck. Usually, the words "Thank you", literally, will do the trick. However, even the occasional small gift to team members will energize them during the project work and keep them on track.

Knowing the Limits

The toughest job for a Project Manager is to say "no" to the members of the team. Some projects cannot be completed on time, or may have to slip their budget or scope. Sometimes, the PM will have no choice except to not push the team members in order to complete the project on time. No amount of pushing can save a project, sometimes.

The main problem for a Project Manager is to recognize the right time to say “enough” and no project management training can prepare you for these moments. Sometimes, treating the team members badly only for the sake of accomplishing a project will result in a disaster, and it’s hard to know when.

How to Improve Team Members

A Project Manager can further display leadership skills by improving members of the project team. This will result in making the project team even more capable as a result of the project work, yielding profitable results on projects to come.

The organizations usually fail to recognize the chance to improve new skills and build skills into workers during the project. Organizations seem to always focus on completing the projects in the shortest possible timeline, thus missing out the huge opportunity of possible future benefit.

Conclusion

Since projects are also businesses, but on a smaller scale, every role necessary for a business should work properly in order to successfully complete the project. Great leadership is very essential as well as a good management for an organization. Therefore, a PM is compelled to be leader as well as a manager for the sake of their project’s well-being.