Question

Describe ALL three theories X, Y, Z in industrial psychology. In your view, are they really theories of "human nature" or are they really descriptions of three kinds of organizations or organizational structure that produce one kind of 'human nature' or another? You must justify your answer with examples with either personal experience or reference current events.

Answer 1

McGregor proposed the Theory X and Theory Y that put forth the alternative sets of assumptions about people at work. He understood motivation of employees using Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs Theory. His theory X assumptions are meant for employees who are motivated by lower order needs and theory Y assumptions are for employees motivated by higher order needs.

The theory X assumption are as follows:

People by nature prefer to work less and they lack ambition. People dislike responsibilities and are unwilling to undertake them and they like to be led rather than taking the lead themselves. People are resistant to change and the organization's needs do not matter to them.

The theory Y assumptions are as follows:

People are not dull or passive because of their nature, but they have become like that because of their experiences in the organisations. People possess all essential qualities like motivation, potential for change, readiness to work and take responsibility but it is the responsibility of the organization to make people realize their abilities and help them develop on these. The task of an organization is to help people achieve their goals by investing efforts for the organization's betterment.

Theory Z was proposed by William Ouchi which is based on the work of McGregor. He suggested in his theory that a combination of the Collectivistic and Individualistic cultural perspectives can help the organization function in a better way. The theory suggests that the organizational culture shows how the employees view the organization. The organizations should focus on production as well as on the employees.

Now in my opinion these theories are just three kinds of organizational structures. The theories may be successful partially in explaining the human nature but the human nature doesn't entirely is the same as the theories suggest. The theory X doesn't consider the individual development and the management training. Also, based on Theory Y assumptions we see that the managers practicing theory Y would have to focus more on the employees rather than production.

I would share a personal experience. I had a friend who was appointed at a very low post which wasn't as good as she deserved because she had good qualifications. She didn't like the work and performed somewhat poorly as even the management of the company was not properly organized. Later she good a much better opportunity and left her job and joined in a new company. This new firm was a multinational firm with well managed staff and work. She enjoyed the work there. Recently she was promoted from her post to a higher one. Thus we see that the theories just explain the organization structure that produces certain kind of human nature.

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