Freedom, Inc_ - Brian M. Carney [3]
1. The average human being has an inherent dislike of work and will avoid it if he can.
2. Because of this human characteristic of dislike of work, most people must be coerced, controlled, directed, or threatened with punishment to get them to put forth adequate effort toward the achievement of organizational objectives.
3. The average human being prefers to be directed, wishes to avoid responsibility, has relatively little ambition, and wants security above all.5
The “Theory Y” assumptions are different:
1. The expenditure of physical and mental effort in work is as natural as play or rest.
2. External control and the threat of punishment are not the only means for bringing about effort toward organizational objectives. Man will exercise self-direction and self-control in the service of objectives to which he is committed.
3. Commitment to objectives is a function of rewards associated with their achievement. The most significant such reward, that is, the satisfaction of ego and self-actualization needs, can be direct products of effort directed toward organizational objectives.
4. The average human being learns, under proper conditions, not only to accept but to seek responsibility.
5. The capacity to exercise a relatively high degree of imagination, ingenuity, and creativity in the solution of organizational problems is widely, not narrowly, distributed in the population.
6. Under the conditions of modern industrial life, the intellectual potentialities of the average human being are only partially utilized.6
McGregor was so convinced of the superiority of “Theory Y” to “Theory X” that in 1950—well before he wrote The Human Side of Enterprise—he predicted the death of “Theory X” organizations within a decade.7 That didn’t happen. Maybe the good Mr. McGregor had never tried to go on a diet.
Dieting is hard because the pleasures of immediate consumption are obvious to our senses, but all the ways in which we are damaging ourselves may be hidden from us in the heat of the moment. It’s the same with bureaucracy. As you’ll see in this book, overbearing control of one’s people comes with all sorts of hidden costs—not just to your bottom line, but even to your health and the health of your employees.
Even so, there are moments when the truth confronts even the most weak-willed dieters. One of the liberating leaders in this book, Jean-François Zobrist, recounted the following story. It occurred during one of those regular visits to FAVI by a CEO who had heard about the company’s remarkable culture and performance and wanted to learn more about it.8 While walking by the supply closet, the visiting CEO was surprised that it not only lacked a lock but that it was missing one of its four walls—there was literally no way to close it securely. Zobrist explained that FAVI, as a liberated company, trusts its people to take what they need for their jobs and that they are free to do so. Just then, a machine operator came over to the closet, so the visitor asked him a question: “What happens if the part you came for is missing?”
“It never happens,” the operator replied, “because the guy who takes the last piece in the box goes to the warehouse and brings back a full box.”
“Fine,” the CEO pressed. “But what if there are no more boxes in the warehouse?”
“Simple,” the operator answered. “If the guy sees that he’s taken the last box from the warehouse, he lets the operator taking care of purchasing know so that more can be ordered.”
“And what if he doesn’t do it?” the CEO persisted—this time, surely, the operator would have no more clever answers.
After a pause, the operator