X or Y !! Which one are you?

The XY theory of management was put forward in 1960 in a book entitled “The Human Side of Enterprise” by an American social psychologist named Douglas McGregor. Although more recent studies of management may show that this theory is a little inflexible it is still referred to regularly in the field of management.

Basically McGregor believed that there are 2 fundamental approaches to managing people i.e. X and Y. Many managers tend towards X and achieve poor results whereas those who use theory Y allow people to grow and develop; thus, achieving better performance. The two styles are also known as: the authoritarian style (X) and the participant style (Y) and they may be described as follows:

Theory X (The Authoritarian manager)

• This manager views employees from the standpoint that they dislike work and will avoid it if they can.
• Following on from the above reasoning the manager believes that people must be coerced to work towards company goals under the threat of punishment.
• They believe that the average person wishes to avoid responsibility and prefers to be directed and that they are unambitious and see their main priority to be security.

Example-  A Punch in Machine or the time clock in an organization. You have to punch in/out partly because the management thinks you'll arrive late and leave early if you don't.

Theory Y. The Participant Style manager.

• This manager believes that effort in work is as natural as work and play.
• They believe that it is unnecessary to apply external control or punishments to force people to work and that they will exercise self-control and self-direction towards company goals.
• The employee will work towards objectives in order to receive the reward and satisfaction of achieving that objective.
  This manager feels that employees usually accept and will indeed seek responsibility.
• They take the viewpoint that most of the population and not just a ‘chosen’ few have the abilities needed to solve organisational problems i.e. imagination, creativity, ingenuity etc.
• Their thought is that generally, in industry, the intellectual potential of the average person is only partially used.

Example - An example is an artist on contract to produce art. You tell the artist what you want done but you leave it to him/her when and how to do it as long as they produce what you want within your timeline. 

Workers

Like the managers, the workers in the organization can be classified as “Lazy” and “Not Lazy”.

So the combinations of managers and workers stated above give rise to a 2X2 matrix and the different situations are explained below.

 With a Manager in Y category a lazy worker can be motivated and with due course of time improve his efficiency ; whereas with a X category manager, a “Not Lazy” worker will get demotivated and the organization may find it hard to retain him

Other Ideas

Leader Member Exchange (LMX) Theory

Sahin proposed the Leader-Member Exchange (LMX) theory. What LMX theory basically points out against McGregor theory is that “leaders develop unique relationships with different subordinates and that the quality of these relationships is a determinant of how each subordinate will be treated”. Hence a manager can belong to both X and Y Category depending upon the relationship he shares with his subordinate.

Theory Z

Theory Z is often referred to as the 'Japanese' management style, proposed by William Ouchi. Theory Z essentially advocates a combination of all that's best about theory Y and modern Japanese management, which places a large amount of freedom and trust with workers, and assumes that workers have a strong loyalty and interest in team-working and the organisation.

Theory Z also places more reliance on the attitude and responsibilities of the workers, whereas Mcgregor's XY theory is mainly focused on management and motivation from the manager's and organisation's perspective.

Personal Experience

I got the opportunity to work with a manager who belonged to the Y Category. He gave me ample freedom to execute my ideas, yet was supportive and helped me whenever I was stuck in my assignments. . He himself was dedicated towards his work without any supervision and his style of managing all activities inspired me a lot.