THEORY X OR THEORY Y

As the Chief Finance Officer of my organization, I manage all the 11 staff under the Finance and Accounts department. My first degree was in Business Administration, and I learnt the theoretical knowledge of management, but now I am faced with practical people management. This isn’t the first time I am managing people, but this so far, has been my most difficult and challenging.

The first week I spent in my organization, I discovered that 98% of the staff in my department were disgruntled with the way the department and company in general had been run in the past. I faced a lot of opposition and acts of insubordination and I became frustrated. I needed to produce results and prove to the organization that they hired a good hand. Other management staff saw my challenges and counseled that in Nigeria the only way to get people to work was to push them hard. However, the harder I pushed them to work, the more resistant and less productive they were.  Reports were coming in late, and even when they get to my desk, they were filled with errors and I will end up having to redo them myself.

After 3 months of dancing to the management style that my organization had adopted, I decided to re-strategize. I made a mental comparison of the past managers I had worked under, I reminisced on those that got the best out of me and how they did it.   I realized that my organization practiced the Theory X management style which I had subconsciously imbibed. I decided to consciously apply the Theory Y management approach and like magic, there was a positive dramatic change within the department.

Theory X represents a negative view of human nature that assumes individuals generally dislike work, are irresponsible, and require close supervision to do their jobs, while theory Y denotes a positive view of human nature and assumes individuals are generally industrious, creative, and able to assume responsibility and exercise self-control in their jobs.

Theory X is an authoritarian style and reflects an underlying belief that management must counteract an inherent human tendency to avoid work Theory X managers rely heavily on threat and coercion to gain their employees' compliance. Theory y however challenges us to innovate, to discover new ways of organizing and directing human effort. A Theory Y manager believes that, given the right conditions, most people will want to do well at work and the satisfaction of doing a good job is a strong motivation.

A lot of my friend’s in various organizations owned and run by Nigerians are un-happy with their job. Everyone wants to work for a multi national company. I have discovered that there's nothing fundamentally wrong with our Nigerian owned company’s except that the leaders of all our major organizations operate under the wrong assumptions."

In his comic classic “Up the Organization”, Robert Townsend wrote powerfully in support of Theory Y:

“People don't hate work. It's as natural as rest or play. They don't have to be forced or threatened. If they commit themselves to mutual objectives, they'll drive themselves more effectively than you can drive them. But they'll commit themselves only to the extent they can see ways of satisfying their ego and development needs.”

Are you a manager? What management style do you operate under? How did you overcome your challenges? Let’s discuss.