Douglas McGregor - Control Quotes

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Formal theories of organization have been taught in management courses for many years, and there is an extensive literature on the subject. The textbook principles of organization — hierarchical structure, authority, unity of command, task specialization, division of staff and line, span of control, equality of responsibility and authority, etc. — comprise a logically persuasive set of assumptions which have had a profound influence upon managerial behavior.

Douglas McGregor
The effectiveness of authority as a means of control depends first of all upon the ability to enforce it through the use of punishment. In the two organizations which have been the models for classical organization theory, the situation with respect to enforcement is clear. In the military, authority is enforceable through the court-martial, with the death penalty as the extreme form of punishment. In the Church, excommunication represents the psychological equivalent of the death penalty.

Douglas McGregor
Man will exercise self-direction and self-control in the service of objectives to which he is committed.

Douglas McGregor
If there is a single assumption which pervades conventional organizational theory, it is that authority is the central, indispensable means of managerial control.

Douglas McGregor
The ingenuity of the average worker is sufficient to outwit any system of controls devised by management.

Douglas McGregor