The Blake Mouton Grid

As I mentioned in a recent post on situational or contingent leadership ("Vroom Vroom"), Robert Blake and Jane Mouton developed their well-known managerial grid model (also known as the Blake Mouton Grid) in the late 1960's.  During their work to improve effective leadership at Exxon, they noted that leadership and management behavior worked primarily along two axes (i.e., concern for production and concern for people) and moved along a continuum.  Using a 2x2 grid, they described five different leadership approaches based upon where they fell along this two-axis continuum.  

Importantly, rather than describing different styles or approaches that a leader can use at different times in his or her career, the Blake Mouton Grid is meant to be used as a self-assessment tool by which organizations can identify a leader's style or approach (and hopefully grow and improve as a leader).

Each dimension is scored on a scale from one (lowest) to nine (highest), based again on whether a leader is more concerned with the individuals on his or her team or the results that the team is trying to achieve.  Based on these scores, there are five different management approaches that describe a given leader:

Impoverished Management (Low Results/Low People): These types of leaders do not care for their team's motivation or morale.  They don't create an environment where their teams can be effective and generate positive results for the organization.  Leaders who fall into this category are not likely to be successful and may even be counterproductive, toxic, or harmful to the organization.  Teams that work for leaders with an Impoverished Management style will generally have low engagement, low motivation, low performance, and low retention.

Produce-or-Perish Management (High Results/Low People): These types of leaders generally adopt a more authoritarian, hierarchical, and autocratic style of leadership (but that is not necessarily always the case).  They focus primarily on the bottom line results, and the needs of the workforce are always secondary to productivity.  These leaders both follow and apply strict rules and policies, reward overperformance, and punish poor performance.  Again, teams that work for leaders with a Produce-or-Perish Management style will generally have low retention (see my posts "People don't leave organizations, they leave bad bosses" and "Fix the environment, not the people...").  

Country Club Management (High People/Low Results): These types of leaders focus excessively on the team's motivation, engagement, morale, and happiness.  While that is certainly not the wrong approach, these leaders do so at the expense of performance and efficiency.  These leaders are more laissez-faire in their approach, often to the point that their teams can lack focus and direction.  While this approach may work for a team with significant experience, motivation, and track record of good performance, less experienced or motivated teams will suffer.

Team Management (High Production/High People): These types of leaders are often great leaders, in that they have teams that perform at a high level and yet remain engaged, motivated, and generally happy.  These leaders create an environment of psychological safety, such that teams feel respected, valued, and committed to achieving the goals of the organization.  

Middle-of-the-Road Management (Medium Results/Medium People): These types of leaders take the proverbial "middle of the road" approach by balancing the needs of the workforce with driving performance.  However, this is not always successful, and most leaders that fall into this category will slip into one of the other quadrants (except Team Management, of course).  

While I personally think it's hard to classify leaders purely just on the two axes of people and production, the Blake Mouton Grid does have some merit, even if it was developed more than 50 years ago.  Our thinking about leadership has certainly changed since Blake and Mouton first developed their model.  Regardless, assessing your own leadership is always a worthwhile exercise.  The recommended approach would be to:

1. List the situations where you performed as a leader.  

2. Place yourself in the Blake Mouton Grid for each situation.  

If you find yourself falling into one particular category, think about how you can move into the Team Management category.  There are likely to be some situations where the Country Club Management or even the Produce-or-Perish Management style is the preferred approach.  As always, the context of a particular situation is important, and there is no one approach that fits every situation.  However, in general, the Team Management approach is likely to be the best approach for the majority of situations that a leader may encounter.