The Managerial Grid
The concept of managerial grid was created by R.R. Blake and Jane S. Mouton of USA. They emphasized that leadership style consists of facts on both task oriented and relation oriented behavior in varying degrees. They have used two phrases.
i) Concern for production: Concern for production means the attitude of the superiors towards a variety of factors concerning production, such as products, procedures, processed, quality of staff service, work load, efficiency and quantity of production.
ii) Concern for people: Concern for people includes degree of personal commitment towards goal achievement, maintaining the self esteem of workers, responsibility and conductibility based on trust rather than on force and satisfying inter-personal relations.
Figure below, shows the degree of concern for production and for people and possible interactions (combinations) between them. The horizontal axis represents concern for production concern. No. 1 in each case represents the minimum concern and No. 9 represents the maximum concern in ascending order.
a) The 9, 1 Managerial Style (Task): 9,1 scale point indicates efficiency results from arranging work in such a way that human elements have little effect.
b) The 1,9 Managerial Style (Country club) 1,9 scale point indicates the thoughtful attention to needs of people for satisfying relationships which leads to a comfortable, friendly organization atmosphere and work tempo.
c) The 1, 1 Managerial Style (Impoverished): 1,1 scale point indicates that exertion of minimum effort to get required work done is appropriate to sustain organization relationship.
d) The 5, 5 Managerial Style (Middle road): 5,5 scale point indicates that adequate performance is possible through balancing the work requirements with maintaining morale of people at satisfactory level.
e) The 9,9 Managerial style(Team): 9, 9 scale point indicates that work accomplishment from committed people and interdependence through a common stake in organization leads to relationship of trust and respect.
Here we have 81 possible positions on the grid reflecting as many leadership styles, but the focus usually centers around five basic styles. The 9, 1 leader is mainly concerned with production and little concern for people. The leader wants to meet production schedule and get the task done at all cost. The 1,9 style reflects a minimum concern for production and maximum concern for people.
Managerial grid approach is attractive, instructive and has a common sense appeal. The grid helps the manager to identify his own leadership style. It serves as a useful framework for the leaders to understand behavior and reactions of people at work. However, managerial grid fails to take cognizance of environmental factors, nature of subordinates and nature of task. Further, it is impossible to calculate 81 combinations to determine leadership behavior.
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Style of leader
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Effectiveness
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1,1 Little concern for either production or people
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The impoverished type
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Worst Leadership style
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1,9 Lowest concern for production highest for people
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The country-club type
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People-oriented style
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9,1 Highest concern for production lowest for people
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The autocrat type
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Production-oriented style
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5,5 Comfortable concern for both production and people
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The middle-of-the-road type
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Maintain present balance style
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9,9 Highest concern for both production and people
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The team type
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Peak of leadership style
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