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Are you the manager you think you are? Gary Newborough encourages managers to test their self-perception against The Managerial Grid, still as relevant today as when it was launched 35 years ago
Most organisations don't have the foresight to change their culture before the world forces change upon them. Some start, then lack the energy, belief or determination to see it through. Others make minor changes and tinker with structures; but all too often the pace of external change is too great for them and they are outrun.
Much time is taken searching for a `route to organisational excellence'. In that search we look for organisations that have achieved excellence, and invariably the focus of attention falls upon the leadership and the type of behaviour that produces organisational excellence. An organisation's structure, plan and concept are crucial to its effectiveness. Yet beyond these, the most significant single factor is the behaviour of the management team. Its members must act as leaders. They must accomplish their objectives through their ability to guide, motivate and integrate the efforts of others.
Early management theorists stressed specific methods to control and direct the work of others, but subsequent research started to uncover the gains that could be made by using less authoritarian methods of leadership. Co-operation, effort and effectiveness improved. Thus a dichotomy was created. On the one side the `scientific management' school and on the other the `human relations' school. A search started for evidence of the advantages of one type of leadership over the other; and that search continues to this day. These 'either/or' styles have been characterised variously as:
Autocratic/democratic;
Authoritarian/participative;
Production centred/people; and even as
Theory X/Theory Y
Presenting leadership as a choice between two extremes has placed many managers in a position where they felt that they could not accept either of the polarised alternatives on offer. When examining successful leadership within their own organisations, it was rarely possible to identify behaviour that could clearly be classified as evidence of either one of these extremes.
The alternative to hot or cold
In January 1964 Bob Blake and Jane Mouton1 published The Managerial Grid, not only as a new model that sought to explain human behaviour, but...