PMI PMP Project Management

Answer: A. True. Douglas McGregor was a Professor at the MIT Sloan School of Management (your editor’s alma mater) who proposed these two theories of human motivation. In his Theory X assumes workers are inherently lazy and will avoid work if they can, while Theory Y assumes workers can be ambitious if they are properly motivated.

Key Takeaways: McGregor didn’t believe either X or Y was right or wrong, but rather that companies tended to follow one approach or the other with regards to managing their employees. It’s valuable to understand what direction the organizational culture where you are working tends to tilt. Most companies are of course somewhere in between.